


White Bear High King Peter

by LucyCrewe11 (Raphaela_Crowley)



Series: Narnian Fairy Tales [1]
Category: Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fairy Tale, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, F/M, Fairy Tale Curses, Fairy Tale Retellings, No Incest, Norwegian Mythology & Folklore, Romance, Talking Animals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2020-07-23
Packaged: 2021-03-05 02:20:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 55,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25456876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raphaela_Crowley/pseuds/LucyCrewe11
Summary: In the house of an old professor, Susan Pevensie finds a doorway leading into a land called Narnia. Once there, she is taken away to the castle of Cair Paravel where she is visited by a mysterious young king every night.
Relationships: Peter Pevensie/Susan Pevensie
Series: Narnian Fairy Tales [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1847062
Kudos: 8





	1. A Lion's Blessing and A Witch's Curse

**Author's Note:**

> Written January 2009

_**Prologue** _

Narnia was a beautiful new world blossoming and blooming into something more glorious and rich each and every day.

It was ruled over by King Frank and Queen Helen who'd been crowned by Aslan himself, the great Lion whose song had called Narnia into existence. They were good rulers and the people were happy. But alas there was one blemish in the perfection of that lovely land. And that was the evil witch who called herself a queen and empress although she hadn't any right to do so. Her name was Jadis and she'd come from another world by accident. Two harmless children whose names were Polly and Digory had come into the world from their own home in another place called 'England' bringing the horrible creature with them by mistake.

Of course they were very sorry that they had done so and wanted to right the wrong. Aslan told them to plant a magical apple tree that would keep the witch at bay, for the smell of the apples would sicken her as soon as she anywhere near it.

However, Jadis, none the worse for being challenged, vowed that she would lay waste to Narnia and some day, rule over it as a great queen. She took any bad souls who were willing to come over onto her side and convinced them to travel to the tree and chop it down.

King Frank had a terrible feeling that something of the sort was going to happen because some of the traitors had once been good-hearted and loyal to him. He had of course noticed the change in his friends and servants and ordered for as many apples as possible to be gathered and placed in the windows of his subjects to keep them safe from the witch.

It only did so much good, and although there were many happy times, there were others not so happy in which Jadis caused the Narnians much suffering.

They wondered if there would ever be any way of destroying the witch and despaired of Narnia ever being truly free. For, any homes that happened to be close to place of Ice that Jadis had set up in far north were victims to her tyranny. Many were even kidnapped and forced to be her slaves and work day and night in the castle, barely even allowed a moment to eat.

It was only by Aslan's good graces that King Frank and Queen Helen were able to keep Jadis (whom they re-named 'The White Witch' because of her white gowns and skin that managed to be white without being pale) at bay most of the time.

And it happened that Queen Helen gave birth to her first child; a son. She sat up in the bed with her back propped up against two layers of thick satin pillows, her forehead and cheeks flushed and drenched with sweat, utterly exhausted from bringing her baby boy into the world. But as she held him in her tired arms, she knew it was well worth it.

"Oh, Frank," sighed Helen, holding the little golden-haired baby up a little so her husband could see him. "Isn't he lovely?"

The baby looked up at his father and smiled his first smile.

Old Frank felt his heart positively melt when he saw the child and he had to blink back tears as he whispered, "He's perfect."

"What a darling little boy he'll be," Helen said softly, gazing down at the child in her arms. "He has the nicest disposition, I can tell." (It was true that the baby was rather quiet and not very fussy, but Helen probably would have said the same thing if he'd been bawling his head off.)

At that moment, the chamber door flew open, a wonderfully light aroma filled the air, and Aslan himself walked into the room, his golden mane swaying to and fro as he approached Helen's bedside.

"Welcome Aslan." King Frank bowed to him respectfully.

"Greetings, first king of the land of Narnia." Aslan nodded to him.

"Have you come to see our baby, Aslan?" Helen asked cheerfully. "Perhaps you would leave him with a blessing?"

"Daughter." Aslan's lips curled up into a smile. "I have indeed a blessing to bestow upon the child."

"Oh, wonderful!" Helen cried happily.

"I tell you that one day this boy will grow up to be the greatest king of Narnia that ever was. He shall grow up to be High King over all other kings in Narnia, even his own father he shall come to rule over. And it will be for his sake that the White Witch will come to an end." Aslan told them in a deep cheering but also somewhat grave voice.

"Did you hear that darling?" Helen whispered, kissing her baby on the forehead. "Aren't you glad, sweetheart?"

"My son, a high king." Frank smiled to himself. "I like that. And think, he shall bring about the end of that horrible witch someday!"

"Such a king should have a name," Helen said firmly. "Our sweet baby hasn't got one yet."

"What would you call him, Aslan?" Frank asked the Lion, who stood watching them with a peaceful expression on his golden face.

"Peter," Aslan told them. "That is a good name for the child."

"Indeed it is." Frank beamed at the Lion, feeling gladder than ever. "My great grandfather was called Peter, and he was a very good man." He looked over to his wife. "What say you, Nellie? Shall Peter be his name?"

Helen looked down at the baby once more. "Yes, Peter is his name. I can't think of any other that would suit him. From the moment Aslan suggested it just now, I felt as if that was his name and no matter what other name we could possibly give him, we'd always call him 'Peter' in our hearts anyway."

One of the midwives had seen all of this take place and spoke to a dwarf friend of hers about it.

"And the best part is that his rein shall be the end of that horrid witch who plagues us whenever she can get away with it!" she'd ended excitedly.

Now the dwarf she had spoken to was quite pleased by this news. A little _too_ pleased. He shared it much too freely. He didn't bother to think if the person he spoke to might be a traitor or else a being flighty enough to change into a traitor someday. And because of this, only two weeks after Peter's birth, Jadis found out about the child and Aslan's blessing. She decided that she would not stand for this. She hoped she might even use it as a stepping stone to making herself the queen.

Helen placed her baby in the cradle of the royal nursery. "Nap time for you, Peter." She hummed a pretty lullaby a wood dryad had taught to her the other day and gently rocked the cradle back and forth.

Suddenly the windows and doors flew open and a burst of cold cruel wind rushed through the room. Jadis stood in the doorway, her eyes gleaming evilly.

"What do you want?" Helen gasped.

"What is this I hear about the future high king over Narnia? This king of kings? This great lord?" She laughed wickedly and walked steadily over to the cradle. Peering in, she added, "Ha, I see only a helpless babe. What is to stop me from getting rid of him now before he should become so great?"

"Get away from him!" Helen cried out, pulling the blanket protectively over his head.

"I can't kill him, though I almost wish I could." Jadis said coldly. "Aslan wouldn't let me kill him. But I can and will do this." She placed her long white hand on the top blanket of the baby's cradle.

Filled with courage only a mother who sees that her child is in danger can ever have or even understand, Helen shoved Jadis out of the way and struck her hard across the face.

In spite of the slap, Jadis seemed happy. "Your blows are of no use now."

"What do you mean?" Helen asked.

"Look at your darling baby boy now and see if he is quite alright." Jadis laughed.

"What have you done to him?" Helen pulled back the blanket and let out a sharp gasp, putting her hand to her heart.

Where her human baby boy, Peter, had been mere seconds ago, there was now a white bear cub.

"Aslan has left the child a blessing." Jadis said coolly. "I've left him a curse. That he should be a bear by day a human only by night. What good is he as a king now?"

Helen scooped up the white bear cub in her arms. She could still see her dear baby looking out at her, for his eyes had remained the same. He let out a frightened grunt and rested his head on his mother's shoulder.

"Don't look so stricken, Helen." Jadis refused to call her 'Queen Helen' knowing it would imply submission of which she of course had none. "There is hope for your stupid little bear-boy yet."

"I don't want to hear it." Helen told her sharply. "You've caused enough pain. Go away."

"I wasn't going to tell you." Jadis tossed her head back. "I'm not such a fool. Let Aslan tell you if he knows." And with that, she ran out of the castle.

Many guards were called out to stop her but all failed and she managed to get back to her castle in the end.

King Frank and Queen Helen were grief-stricken over the fate of their son. What could they do with a boy who was a white bear during the day and a human only at night?

"I don't care," Helen wept, clinging to her bear-baby. "I shall love him all the same. He's still my beautiful son."

"Loving him is never the question, Nellie." Frank said gently. "But is he safe?"

" _Safe_?" Helen said almost angrily. "Nothing is safe. Aslan himself isn't safe and yet, he is good. Couldn't our poor little son be the same?"

It was at that moment that Aslan returned and hung his head sadly as he looked over at the bear cub who had just turned back into a human baby now that the night had fallen. "Poor child."

"Oh, Aslan!" Helen wailed. "Can you do nothing to help him?"

"I can call up another tree to keep the white witch at bay once more. All of those whom she has already imprisoned are trapped, but it will keep her from taking more of them in the meantime."

"A fine idea," Frank said. "But what of Peter?"

"The spell can be broken," Aslan told them. "But not by me."

"Will you explain it all to us?" Helen pleaded. "I wouldn't hear it from that witch if she would have told me, but I'd hear it from you, Aslan. Do tell me what I am to do about my son."

Aslan told her how he might be saved. It would all depend on a daughter of Eve. If she fulfilled her role properly, she would save him. But if she should fail, he would be in danger, possibly even from Jadis herself.

"But what lady could have faith and love enough to rescue him?" said Frank hopelessly. "I don't believe the best woman in the world could meet the conditions needed."

"Don't despair," Helen said softly. "It is some hope. I shall hold tightly onto it."

"The poor lad," sighed Frank. "He'll have to be older in order to be saved and he'll never know what it's like to have a normal childhood."

"My poor high king," Helen whispered to the White Bear High King Peter who looked up at his mother unable to understand what was had happened to him and what would be sure to happen to him in the future.


	2. Susan enters a wardrobe

" _Susan_ ," Mrs. Pevensie said in a soft sentimental tone as she tightly embraced her only daughter. "Be a big girl," she added, pulling away at last.

Susan Pevensie blinked back the tears that filled the rims of her eyes and nodded.

"I hope you won't find the country too boring," Mrs. Pevensie said, trying -and failing- to sound cheerful.

"Boring is safe," Susan said practically.

"That's a good girl." She gently stroked her daughter's chin one last time. "Do you have all your things?"

"Yes, Mum," Susan said quietly.

"Family photograph?"

"Check."

"Vitamins?"

"Check."

"School study books so you are prepared for next year?"

Susan nodded again. "I've got it all."

"Alright then," Mrs. Pevensie said with a heavy sigh. "Off you go."

"Goodbye, Mum," Susan said one last time, so softly that it can't be said whether or not her mother actually heard her.

The reason Susan was being separated from her mother was because of the air raids over London. Mrs. Pevensie was already a widow because her husband, Susan's father, had died in the war only two weeks ago and she had decided that she wouldn't risk losing her daughter as well. At only fourteen, Susan was still young enough to be evacuated to the countryside with the other children. She was to stay with an old Professor who was said to have more than enough extra room in his large old mansion to help out with the children in war times.

Giving her beloved mother one last sad but brave glance, Susan picked up her suitcase and boarded the train.

As she walked to her seat, the handle of the suitcase fell off and landed on her left foot. "Ow."

Some younger children who'd been watching her laughed into the palms of their hands. Susan ignored them, reattached the handle, and took her seat. She pulled out a newspaper and started working on the crossword puzzle.

"Susan Pevensie, is that you?" An all too familiar, nasal sounding, voice said.

If Susan had been more sarcastic and less practical in nature she might have said, "It's not Father Christmas." As it was, she said it in her mind. Out loud, she said, "Katie!" a fake smile plastered across her face.

Katie and Susan knew each other from school. They were something of rivals, both having the highest marks in their grade, but they acted pretend-civil in public, and sometimes even _out_ of public, if they happened to meet in an alley way or something. More than a few clueless grown-ups who hadn't bothered to pay close enough attention were under the mistaken impression that the two girls were friends. Sadly, many of these grown-ups were teachers who'd often pair them together for school activities.

Katie threw back her head, tossing back her long strawberry-blond hair. "It's Katherine. I'm too old to go by a nickname. Fancy your still allowing your friends to call you Su." She placed her over-sized trunk in the overhead compartment with no regard for the fact that she'd now taken up all the space up there, leaving none for anybody else. She even took Susan's suitcase down (causing the handle to break again), saying her things needed more room.

Susan tried to snap the handle back into place.

"Still too poor to buy a decent one?" Katie asked in a condescending voice, taking her seat.

"No," Susan lied. "I just like old things."

"Yes, I suppose that explains the second-hand clothing as well." Katie looked at Susan's coat.

"I just love your hair." Susan folded her arms across her chest as she eyed the new curls at the bottom of Katie's otherwise just barely wavy hair. She was fairly certain they were extensions. "Did you buy or lease it?"

Katie glowered at her but didn't say another word. She simply turned to look out the window and tried to act like Susan's comment didn't offend her in the least.

Suddenly there was a _thud_.

A tall, thin, freckled boy about a year or so older than Susan and Katie plopped himself in the seat beside Susan, across from Katie.

"Katie, why didn't you wait for me?" The boy frowned at her. "Auntie said for us to stick together."

"You two know each other?" Susan asked in a surprised voice.

"It's Katherine," Katie said scornfully, still ignoring Susan.

"I'm Simon," The boy said. " _Katherine_ 's cousin." He said shooting Katie a smug smile. "I'm being sent to stay with chap who goes by the name of Kirke."

"I hope you'll call him Professor to his face and not _chap_." Katie said snottily. "You needn't make me look bad. Don't you dare call the professor Kirke, Buddy, chum, or pal. And if you call him 'Digory', I will smack you."

"Wait, you're both going to Professor Kirke's?" Susan gulped, willing herself not to leap off the train and run back home as fast as her legs could carry her. She wanted to scream long and loud. Being sent away was bad enough. But being sent away to stay with Katie (I'm sorry, 'Katherine') was almost unbearably horrid. If it had only been Simon it wouldn't have been such a nightmare. She'd only just met him but Susan couldn't help but think he didn't seem that bad. A little disrespectful maybe, but not that bad.

"Yes," Katie said, wondering what Susan looked so upset about.

"So am I," Susan moaned.

" _Great_." Katie rolled her eyes, pouted her lips, and sulked.

Simon looked pleased. "I'm glad. Even _you've_ got to be more fun than cousin is."

The train started off with a roar and Susan got up to wave goodbye to her mother who was still anxiously watching the train as it started to roll away.

She stuck her head out the window and waved.

"Goodbye my dear!" Mrs. Pevensie called, waving back.

Hours later, Susan, Simon, and Katherine stood at the country platform waiting for the Professor to come and get them.

"The professor knew we were coming," Susan said in a weary voice.

"I suppose we've just been incorrectly labeled." Simon sighed, trying to grab onto Katie's tag while she attempted to shove him away.

Just before Katie and Simon could get into a slap-fight, a wooden wagon pulled by a pretty gray-spotted white horse arrived. It was driven by a disagreeable-looking old woman with her silver-gray hair wrapped up in a hard tight bun covered by a crisp brown sun hat that must have been brand new or else very well maintained.

"Mrs. Macready?" Susan stammered nervously. She had been told that Macready was the last name of the professor's house keeper and that she was a very proper woman and keeping on her good side was essential.

"I'm afraid so," the woman sighed airily. She peered down at the three of them. "Is this it then? Haven't you brought anything else? Any others coming?"

"No ma'am," Susan said respectfully. "It's just us."

"Small favors." Mrs. Macready shrugged. "Climb in."

The three of them piled into the wagon with Susan on one side, Katie on the other, and Simon in the middle.

"Are you siblings?" Mrs. Macready demanded.

"No I'm her cousin." Simon pointed to Katie. He lifted his chin at Susan. "I don't really know her."

"I trust there won't be any quarrels; Professor Kirke is a busy man and isn't used to hearing children roam about his house. Thankfully you're all old enough to care for yourselves. I was worried that there might be some loud little ones." Mrs. Macready stopped the wagon in front of an enormous house.

They all climbed out and walked in while Mrs. Macready sternly informed them of the rules. "No sliding on the banisters, no improper use of the dumbwaiter, no shouting, no running, no..."

Katie shoved Susan into a marble statue. Susan pressed into it with the palm of her hands to keep from having a full body impact with it.

"No touching of the historical artifacts!" snapped Mrs. Macready, glaring at Susan.

Katie smiled innocently.

Susan frowned at her. This was going to be one very uncomfortable stay.

"And above all, do not, I repeat, do _not_ bother the professor," Mrs. Macready added firmly.

I wont do that... Unless Katie shoves me in his office and locks the door, Susan thought bitterly.

The next day, it was pouring out.

"Holy cow!" gasped Simon, looking out the window. "It's Noah's bloody blasted flood out there."

Katie let out a prudish gasp, covered her ears, and stepped back as though expecting a lightning bolt to strike Simon down right then and there.

"Oh, dry up." Simon laughed, snapping the curtain back into place.

Susan sighed and pulled out a dictionary and started reading it. It wasn't as if she had anything better to do. She started with 'Aardvark' and planned to work her way to 'giraffe' by mid-afternoon.

Simon started tossing a small cricket ball around. He lost hold of it and accidentally knocked Katie in the head.

"Ow!" She shouted, picking it up and hurling it back at him as hard as she could.

"AH!" Simon ducked, dodging the ball.

Which, with nothing else to hit first, crashed right through the window and landed in the muddly lawn outside.

"What on earth is going on up there?" Mrs. Macready's voice called up to them.

"Oh no, The Macready!" cried Susan, her voice filled with alarm. She'd be furious when she saw the window. Katie would probably blame her even thought she hadn't so much as touched the ball or the window.

"Hide me!" Simon raced out of the room.

"I'm too young and pretty to die!" bawled Katie, leaping about in a tizzy.

Soon they were all racing up and down the hallway like chickens without heads, feeling more doomed every second.

Susan finally came to a large velvet curtain. It was wide and long enough to hide a person. She pulled it back.

Katie raced forward and shoved Susan out of the way. "I was here first," she lied.

Susan shook her head and tried to open several doors which were all locked. When it seemed like there was no hope, she found one pretty much empty spare room that wasn't locked up. She ran in and closed the door tightly behind herself. There was no bolt on it which meant that the Macready might come in here looking for her. What would she do? She saw a large white sheet covering something in the far corner of the otherwise vacant room.

She walked over to it and pulled down the sheet. Behind it was a large apple-wood wardrobe with a looking-glass on the door.

"Surely it'll be all locked up," Susan whispered to herself. She tried the door anyway and found that it opened quite easily. She had no intention of going in until she heard foot steps in the hallway outside the room. The Macready would surely find her if she didn't climb into the wardrobe and pull herself as deep into the back as she could.

She climbed in, careful not to shut the door all the way, pushing her way passed three rows of soft fur coats, expecting to feel the back of the wardrobe at any given moment. But it just seemed to be longer and longer. How big it was! And why was it so cold? Something crunched under her left foot.

Bother, she thought, I've smashed a mothball, I suppose.

She took another step back and then let out a gasp. "Oh! My back is against a tree!" She spun around and saw a snowy wood.

"What the..." Susan spun around again and saw the slightly open wardrobe door. "How is it outside and winter in here?"

She thought of exploring a bit but then realized she was in summer clothes. She'd be sure to catch her death! Wouldn't mother be simply furious if she knew. Then a new idea dawned on her. Maybe she could wear one of the fur coats. They weren't hers but it wasn't stealing if you weren't even taking them out of the wardrobe in the first place.

"I suppose this whole wood is in the wardrobe though it really isn't possible," Susan mumbled as she slipped on a long fur coat and took a few steps forward into the woods.

After a very short while, she came to a lamppost. It stood all alone in the mist of the trees.

"What's that doing here?" Susan wondered aloud.

A small creature with goat legs and a human upper-body came trotting by carrying an umbrella and a lot of packages. He gasped and dropped them and let out a small yelp when he saw Susan standing there.


	3. The White Bear Susan found there

"Hullo." Susan tried not to sound afraid. She felt very uneasy around the strange-looking creature but he didn't seem like he meant her any real harm.

"Hello there," the goaty thing said as Susan bend down to help him pick up his fallen packages. "Thank you."

"You're welcome," Susan said politely, trying not to look down at his legs. If it wasn't for them, and the two little horns sticking out of the top of his head, she could have easily have mistaken him for any normal English gentleman she might meet.

He noticed her uncomfortable expression. "My name is Tumnus. I'm a faun."

Susan thought she must be dreaming. There were no such thing as fauns outside of Roman Myths. And yet, here was one very polite little faun standing in front of her. Even if he wasn't real, she mustn't be rude and not introduce herself.

"My name is Susan," she told him. "Susan Pevensie." Unsure if the funny creature knew what she was, she added, "I'm a human." She stuck out her hand to shake his, trying to ignore the slight traces of goat-fur growing out of them. "I'm very pleased to meet you, Mr. Tumnus."

"Well now, if you are human, I suppose that makes you a daughter of Eve." Tumnus beamed at her. "I'm so glad one has come to Narnia at last."

"Narnia?" Susan crinkled her forehead. "What's that?"

Tumnus smiled at her. "Here. Where we are." He pointed with his umbrella. "Everything from the lamppost to the Castle of Cair Paravel by the eastern ocean. Every stick and stone you see, every bit of frozen ground, is Narnia."

"This is an absurdly large wardrobe," Susan mumbled to herself.

"Wardrobe?" Mr. Tumnus seemed confused.

"That's where I came in from," Susan explained. "From the wardrobe in the spare room."

"Ah, Spare Oom..." Tumnus looked like he was trying very hard to remember something. "I've never been much good at geography."

"Well, I suppose I'd best be getting back now," Susan said, wondering if Mrs. Macready had entered the spare room by now or not. If only there was some way of insuring that she'd believe her about the window. Then she could go back and get out of this cold strange place.

"Oh no, really, you must stay." Mr. Tumnus looked like he was about to get on his knees and beg. "We need you!"

"What are you talking about?" Susan asked him, trying not to laugh. " _Who_ needs me?"

"All of Narnia," Tumnus told her. "We all need you." He grabbed onto her wrist and started marching further into the woods.

Susan let out a gasp and pulled away. "What are you doing?"

"You can't be left here," Tumnus said shortly, not because he was cross but because he was worried. "She might find you. Anyone might tell her you've come. Even some of the trees are on her side. Or else you might go back to Spare Oom before you've had a chance to save us."

"What _are_ you talking about?" Susan snapped, feeling very exasperated with him now.

"We can talk more at my house," Tumnus said, trying to seize her wrist again. "No one will be able to overhear us there."

Susan didn't know that the poor faun's motives were as good as gold and that he only meant to help her. She thought he was trying to kidnap her and haul her off to god-knows-where in this cold icy land. She would have run back through the wardrobe, but if she went that way, she would pass Tumnus and he would be able to grab onto her. If she ran the other way she might get lost. Having no time to weigh the benefits of either choice, Susan took off, racing as far away as she could from the faun who, much to her horror, was chasing after her.

She kept on running through the snowy woods, slipping on ice patches and bruising her knees and shins, but couldn't let herself stop. That goaty faun thing might catch her if she stopped even to catch her breath. Suddenly, without warning, when she'd thought she'd lost Mr. Tumnus at last, she tripped over a rock and fell face down in the snow.

When she looked up, she saw she was a couple of feet away from a half-frozen lake.

Next to the lake, was a pretty, fair-haired little girl of about seven or eight. She was bundled up in expensive looking cloaks, caps, and muffs. She took a step too close to the lake and her foot fell through on what she'd mistaken for solid ground. She tried to pull herself back up out of the deep cold water but couldn't get a grip. She couldn't keep her head above the water and it was almost certain that she would drown.

Susan had just made up her mind to race down there and throw herself into the water in hopes of saving the little girl. Yes, her parents had always told her it wasn't wise to go swimming in a place you didn't know, but it was that or let the child sink to the bottom and die. She was a strong swimmer and could tread water. She only hoped it wasn't quite as deep as it looked. She stood up and made a dash for it.

Before she could reach the lake however, a large white bear came bounding seemingly out of nowhere and dived into the water. Susan watched in horror and amazement as the bear grabbed onto the back of the little girl's dress with his teeth and pulled her up out of the water.

Susan felt her knees knocking together. That poor girl was sure to be the great beast's supper if nothing was done about it. Susan wasn't very brave by nature but found herself doing something quite courageous indeed.

She picked up the first large stick she could find and shook it at the white bear. "Stay away from her."

As gently as a mother cat puts down a kitten, the white bear placed the little girl on the ground. She coughed, sat up, and gasped when she saw Susan standing there shaking the large stick.

The white bear ran away, leaving Susan and the little girl behind.

The little girl stood up and raced over to Susan happily. "Oh you've come at last!"

"Are you alright, dear?" Susan asked the shivering child. "You must be soaked. Did the bear hurt you?"

The little girl let out a laugh. "Of course not! That 'bear' you just saw was my elder brother, Peter."

"The bear is your _brother_?" Susan wondered if the girl had hit her head on something when she'd fallen through the ice.

She lowered her voice. "He's under a spell."

"Alrighty then." Susan humored the child, taking her hand. "Let's go find your parents and tell them you didn't get eaten by your er...brother..."

"I don't have parents," the little girl said.

Susan was taken aback. "You don't?"

"Well I suppose I did, but I don't remember them," the little girl tried to explain.

"What's your name and where do you live?" Susan asked her sharply but not unkindly. She had to get the girl to an indoor place before she caught her death.

"I'm Lucy," the girl said. "Queen Lucy. I live at the castle of Cair Paravel."

Great. Not only did the girl think a crazed wild white bear was her brother, but she was also convinced that she was a queen. How lovely. Susan didn't know how much more of this nonsense she could take.

"He'll be right back, I'm sure." Lucy said in a friendly tone.

"Who are you talking about?" Susan asked her.

"My brother," Lucy said. "He wasn't running away from you and your stick, you know."

"What was he running away from then?" Susan asked.

"Nothing," Lucy said. "He just went back home to get something."

"Home...as in your _castle_?" Susan asked, wondering how much longer she could be around this strange Lucy-child without losing her mind.

"Yes of course." Lucy told her cheerfully, giving her a hug as she spoke. "I'm just so glad you've come! What's your name?"

"Susan Pevensie."

"That's a nice name." Lucy smiled at her.

"Thank you."

"I just know you'll love staying with us," Lucy said happily.

"Wait... What are you talking about?" Susan gasped. What was wrong with everyone?

Before she could answer, Susan saw the white bear coming back towards them. There was something hanging from his mouth. It glittered in the winter sunlight and was probably made of gold.

At once, Susan seized Lucy's hand and started pulling her into the woods. She knew there was little hope of out-running the bear but she clung to it anyway, ignoring Lucy's pleas of, "No, wait. He won't hurt you!"

Suddenly the white bear came at them full speed and plopped himself in front of them.

Susan let out a whimper.

Lucy let out an excited squeal.

In the white bear's mouth was a golden wreath-like crown. He looked up at Susan and placed it at her feet. Then he looked up at her with the saddest bright blue eyes Susan had ever seen. The expression in them was almost human rather than wild and dumb.

"What is that?" Susan looked down at the wreath-crown laying in the snow in front of her. The white bear looked at her eagerly as if expecting her to do something.

Susan shrugged and bent down to pick it up. It was very beautiful, the way it shone in the light of the low-hanging sun. She held it in her hands and rubbed her thumb against it. After examining it for a moment, she held it back out to the white bear. "It's lovely."

"Keep it," The white bear said.

Susan jumped back. "Did you just...?" Had that giant polar bear just talked to her?

"You don't have to be afraid," The white bear said in as soft a tone as a bear can manage. "I won't hurt you."

"Who are you?" Susan asked, suddenly feeling very dazed.

"My name is Peter," he told her. "That little girl you were running off with is my sister."

Susan looked back at Lucy.

"I tried to tell you." Lucy shrugged.

"I'm not really a bear," Peter said. "I'm actually a high king."

"You look like a bear to me," Susan commented dryly.

"I'm under a spell." He sighed.

"Sure you are." Maybe there _was_ a large talking white bear in front of her, but there was no way he was a high king. That just took it to a whole new level of bizarre.

Suddenly, a breathless Mr. Tumnus came running up to them. "Ah there you are!"

"Hello, Mr. Tumnus." Lucy smiled at him. "How are you today?"

"I'm well thank you, your majesty." Tumnus smiled back. "Thanks be to the Lion that you found the daughter of Eve before the White Witch did."

"The white _what_?" Susan asked.

"The White Witch." Lucy shuddered as she explained it. "She's the one who did this to Peter."

"I'm sorry to hear that but if you'll excuse me, I really have to go." Susan tried to walk away.

A large beaver popped out of a nearby dam and plopped himself in front of her. "You can't just leave."

"He's right," Lucy told her.

"I think you're all crazy," Susan said flatly, trying to get around them.

The white bear over-took her and stood in front of her again. "Please don't go." He looked up at her with pleadingly.

"I have to," Susan protested weakly.

"No you don't," The bear insisted. "Please, just climb on my back and we'll get you to safety before the white witch learns you're here."

"I am not climbing on your..." Before Susan could finish, Mr. Tumnus, the beaver, and Lucy lifted her up onto his soft white back.

"We don't mean you any harm," Mr. Tumnus assured her. "But if the witch finds you, she'll kill you."

"Why?" Susan wanted to know.

"It's sort of hard to explain," The white bear said, turning his head to look back at her. "Hang on tight."

Before Susan could take a deep breath and explain to these strange people/creatures why she simply couldn't stay, that she was just a normal girl from Finchely and that they must see reason and let her go back to the professor's house, the white bear was already running so fast that everything was a blur. She knew there were going over miles and miles. If she was walking, it would have taken at least a week.

With this bear, it only took about five minutes.

When he stopped they were in front of a large castle by a beautiful sea with bright green winter waves that lapped against the shore.

"Weclome to Cair Paravel," The white bear said in a voice that was supposed to sound cheerful but came across to Susan as rather dismal.

"Mr. Bear, I..." Susan started.

He let out a slight growl. "My name is Peter."

"Oh sorry," Susan apologized. "Peter, I can't stay here."

"You have to," Peter told her. "Please get off my back now." He lowered himself to the ground so that she could climb off.

Once her feet were on solid ground again, Peter told her to follow him. She let out a frustrated sigh and trailed behind him into the great castle.

She had no idea what she was getting herself into.


	4. Sleeping Arrangements

The castle was stunning, with the richest colours and textures Susan had ever even imagined. There was a long hallway leading into what was clearly the throne room. In there, were four thrones up on a large dais in front of a series of elegant stained-glass windows. In a small corner window off to the side of the thrones, there was a single silver-coloured apple resting on the sill.

"Do you like it?" The white bear asked Susan.

"It's very nice..." Susan stammered, knowing it was an understatement. "But I really must-" She didn't have a chance to finish speaking before she was tackled to the floor by someone behind her. "Ow!"

"Ed!" The white bear growled, looking very displeased. "Control yourself."

"Sorry," Susan heard a young, almost sulky, voice say as whomever was on top of her got up.

"How many times have I told you not to run in the throne room?" The white bear groaned as the boy helped Susan to her feet.

The boy rolled his eyes.

Now that he was standing in front of her, Susan could see what he looked like. He was only a few years older than Peter's sister, Lucy. He was raven-haired with a wise, pale, slightly freckled, thin face. There was a lop-sided silver crown resting on his head (The force of the tackle had nearly knocked it off).

"Edmund." The white bear pointed his nose towards the boy. "This is..." He paused realizing he'd never actually gotten her name.

"Susan." Susan sighed. "Susan Pevensie."

"Susan, this is my brother, Edmund," the white bear introduced him. "He's going to show you to your bed chamber. I've have to run back and get Lucy before the sun sets."

"I'm not staying here," Susan insisted, actually losing her cool for a moment and stamping her foot.

"Pete..." Edmund gave the white bear a worried glance.

"It's alright, Ed," The white bear said softly. "She'll get used to it. She has to."

"What if she can't?" Edmund whispered.

"Then all is lost," the white bear sighed in such a tender voice that Susan felt sorry for him and calmed down a bit.

Would it really be so bad to humor them for a bit? Just stay with them for a little while until they came to their senses and let her go back? Really, they didn't seem all that bad. Of course there was always the worry that sooner or later Mrs. Macready would realize she was missing and tell the Professor who'd have to write to mother... Susan shuddered at the very thought. Wouldn't mother be so frightened! And, oh, maybe they'd get the police out looking for her! They'd never know she'd just slipped into the wardrobe and been taken against her will to some strange castle and was staying to try and make a sad white bear feel better. No, she couldn't stay. Not even that tender voice coming out of the deep rumbling body of the bear would convince her to spend another minute here.

"I have to go home," Susan said, tapping Edmund on the shoulder.

He brushed her hand away and went back to talking to the white bear. "Where did you leave Lucy?"

"She's with Tumnus, she's perfectly safe," the white bear assured him.

"I should have known." Edmund smiled, patting the bear playfully on the head. "The perfect big brother."

"He's a bear!" Susan blurted out unable to keep her thoughts to herself anymore.

"Oh hush up," Edmund said, before adding -to the white bear, "Should we leave her there for the night?"

The white bear looked horrified. "Have you lost your marbles?"

"I just mean... Can you make it back before the sun sets?" Edmund explained. "You haven't much time."

"I can if I hurry," he said, rushing out of the throne room like a white flash of lightning.

"Come on." Edmund started walking out of the room and motioned for Susan to follow. "Your chamber's this way."

"Look here," Susan said firmly as she fast-walked to keep up with him. " _Prince_ Edmund?"

"It's King Edmund actually," Edmund said, slowing down the pace a bit realizing that she was having a hard time keeping up and was falling behind.

"But I thought that the white bear was the king," Susan said before she could stop herself. _What am I saying?_

"Yes, he's the high king," Edmund explained. "I'm just a regular king. I know, it's confusing."

"Very," Susan agreed as they made a left turn down the corridor.

"Well, being a bear, Peter can't do all of the things that he needs to do, so I fill in. I'm a sort of understudy king I guess you could say," Edmund told her. "Does that make any sense?"

"A little," Susan admitted. "But you can't possibly be old enough to rule a kingdom on your own... What happened to your parents?"

"They're gone," Edmund said gravely. "Father died two days before mother gave birth to Lucy. He had a heart attack. As for mother, I don't know what happened to her. Only a week after Lucy was born, she went missing. We sent out search parties to find her but they never found so much as a trace. It was as if she'd vanished into thin air."

"I'm sorry," Susan said softly. These poor children. No wonder they were insane. They didn't even have a mother. Putting and two together, it must have meant that they had no one except that white bear who thought he was a high king to raise them. And that was just plain sad. "My father died too. In the war."

"I'm so sad for you," Edmund said sympathetically as they came to a stop in front of a double-door with little white jewels stuck around the borders. He flung the doors open. "This is where you will sleep."

Susan's mouth dropped open. She couldn't help it. It was the biggest, most luxurious, room she'd ever laid eyes on. There were two bay windows with dark purple velvet curtains on either side of the room. A gloriously warm well-lit and very clean fire place to the left of a large soft-looking bed piled with wool blankets and down-feather pillows.

"Will it do?" Edmund's mouth twitched with a deep sense of humor about the situation.

Susan nodded. It would do alright.

"Make yourself comfortable," Edmund told her, leaving the room. "There are a few nightgowns and dressing-gowns in the wardrobe, feel free to use them. I'll send one of the dryads up with some food for you. You must be hungry."

Susan felt her stomach growl. She hadn't eaten anything since breakfast. And now the sun was almost setting. Even if she couldn't (and wouldn't) stay, she could at least have a meal. If the meals here were even half as fancy as the rooms were, she could hardly wait.

Early that night, Peter (now a human) walked into the throne room where Edmund was waiting up for him. He had just put Lucy to bed and was feeling rather sleepy. Now that he wasn't in his bear form anymore, he felt very tired from running back and fourth across Narnia.

"Did you make it back alright?" Edmund asked him.

"Yes." Peter yawned. "We were just in time. Did you show Susan to her room like I asked?"

"Aw, man." Edmund pretended to look shocked. "I knew I was forgetting something! Do you mean I wasn't supposed to leave her in the garden with an extra pillow?"

"Very funny, Ed." Peter laughed, messing up his little brother's hair.

"Yes, I showed her to her room," Edmund assured him.

"What do you think of her?" Peter asked.

"A bit high-strung." Edmund shrugged.

"Yes, I'd noticed that too." Peter agreed with him. He smiled a little and added, "She's very pretty."

"Peter?" Edmund said cautiously. "What if she can't break the spell?"

"All we can do is hope for the best." Peter sighed. "But won't it be wonderful when I can run around on a beach in broad daylight without having pounds of fur to carry with me? And to never have to kill a seal again would make me the happiest man alive."

"You killed a seal?" Edmund raised an eyebrow at him.

"It wasn't a _talking_ seal," Peter protested. "And I was starving. It's dreadful having a bear's appetite."

"I'll bet," Edmund said supportively.

"Alright, I'm going to bed now. Did you make sure they put out the fire in her room?" Peter asked.

"Yes, of course," Edmund assured him.

"All of the curtains are shut?" Peter checked.

"Yes."

"All candles blown out?" Peter double checked.

"Peter, I assure you, there is no light in that room." Edmund said, feeling rather tired himself. "I know what could happen if she sees you."

"Alright then." Peter took a deep breath and walked out of the throne room. "Goodnight, Edmund."

"Night, Peter," he called after his brother as the sound of his boots traveled down the corridor.

Susan had never been more comfortable in her life. Sleeping on that bed was like sleeping on a cloud. It was impossibly soft and yet it was firm enough that it never sagged even a little. And it was just so _big_! She wondered why they'd given such a large bed that was clearly made for at least two just for her. Maybe they wanted her to like them so she'd stay. Well it wasn't going to win her over but she'd be sure to get a goodnight's rest all the same. She rolled over to the other side and bumped into something.

The something was actually a someone. There was someone in the bed with her! She had no doubts it was a man or at least a boy. Even in the horribly weak lighting, she could figure out that much.

Whomever he was let out a grunt and mumbled something before waking up.

Susan was so startled that she let out a scream.

The stranger climbed out of the bed and took a step towards her.

Susan was completely terrified. Here she was in this strange land, forced to stay in some castle where the only humans were children raised by bear, in a room that while beautiful wasn't familiar, and now there was a stranger in it! She had no idea what he might do to her. She made a dash for the doors and tried to get them open. Much to her horror, they wouldn't budge. It was as if they were locked and sealed together. She let out a whimper followed by another scream, much louder this time.

The stranger raced over and put his hand over her mouth. It was so dark that even at this close range she couldn't see anything besides the faint outlines of a human boy, his face was completely hidden in the shadows "Will you stop that? You're going to wake the whole castle!"

Susan let out another whimper. As soon as he let go of her mouth she started to cry.

"Don't cry...shh..it's alright..." The stranger tried to comfort her.

"Who are you?" Susan gulped back the lump in her throat, still feeling very frightened.

"Don't you recognize my voice?" he asked gently.

"No," Susan said softly. A few more tears escaped and ran down her cheeks.

"It's me, Peter," he whispered.

"Don't be ridiculous," Susan huffed. "Peter is a bear and even though I can't see your face, I can tell you aren't."

"I turn back into myself every night," Peter explained.

"Good for you," Susan said feeling a little angry with him now for scaring the living daylights out her at this ungodly hour. "But what in the world are you doing in here?"

"Well I was sleeping," Peter said, his voice a little less gentle now. "That's when people lie quietly all night without making noise and get the rest they desperately need; a concept you don't seem to understand."

"Well excuse me for being surprised to discover that you were in my bed." Susan glared at him even though it was so dark that he probably couldn't see her do it. "Go sleep somewhere else."

"This is my castle, I'll sleep anywhere I like," Peter insisted.

"Not with me you won't." Susan stood her ground.

"I'm not leaving this room," Peter told her.

"Fine then." Susan turned to the door again. "I'm leaving." She found she still couldn't get it open. "Why won't this door open?"

She got the feeling that he was smiling even though she couldn't see it. "Night, Susan." He climbed back into the bed.

"I hate you." Susan grabbed a pillow and dropped it on the floor.

"What are you doing?" Peter laughed.

"Sleeping on the rug in front of the fire, that's what," Susan told him. "It's sort of cold in here." She tried to light the fire.

Peter jumped back up out of bed and grabbed her by both wrists. "Don't you even think about lighting that!"

"Let go of me!" Susan tried to pull her wrists away from him.

"I will," Peter promised, slowly loosening his grip. "But you can't light that fire."

"Can I at least have a candle?" Susan asked. "It's too cold not to have anything."

"It's not cold in the bed," Peter pointed out. "And no, you cannot have a candle."

"Fine," Susan huffed, storming back towards the bed as he finally let go of her wrists. "But you stay on your own side."

"Same to you," Peter said, climbing into bed again. "By the way, you snore."

"I do not," Susan retorted, pulling the covers up to her chin.

"Do too." Peter tried to yank some of the covers back into his half of the bed. "Don't hog all the blankets."

"I thought you wanted to sleep."

"I do."

"Then go to sleep."

"I _was_ asleep."

"Goodnight, Peter."

"Goodnight, Susan."


	5. Magic Horns Come in Handy

The sun had risen high over Cair Paravel when Susan finally woke up. She found herself alone in the bed again and wondered if she had just dreamed of her annoying visitor.

But it couldn't have been a dream. It just couldn't have been. She'd _felt_ him when he had put his hand over her mouth and when he'd grabbed her wrists. You didn't really feel things in dreams, you only thought you did. Looking over to the pillow beside her, the one she hadn't used, she saw it was indented as though someone had been sleeping on it.

See, thought Susan rather self-righteously, I'm not crazy. He _was_ here.

She wondered why he had been so set on staying. Surely this wonderful castle had other bedrooms. A new idea came to her. Maybe she'd been put in _his_ chamber as some kind of a joke and he'd been in the right after all. That King Edmund was probably having a good laugh about it right now! But then again, if that was the case, why had the door been locked? Why hadn't he kicked her out of the room? And even though the room was lovely, surely the high king had an even grander one. But then why wasn't he in it last night instead of pestering her? What was wrong with him? (Aside from being a bear half the time).

As Susan sat up in the bed, her knee brushed against something under the covers. Peeling back the bedclothes, she saw a little brown package with a note attached to it.

She read the note first.

_To Susan Pevensie:_

_In this package you will find a small white horn._

_Please keep it with you at all times._

_Blow on it, and wherever you may be,_

_some sort of help will come to you._

_Signed,_

_Peter, The High King of Narnia._

"Why does he keep giving me presents?" Susan wondered aloud, still not fully recovered from the fact that just yesterday she'd been allowed to keep the golden wreath-crown. Shrugging, she pulled away the string that held the brown paper in place, and examined the horn.

It was made of fine white ivory. It was beautifully carved almost as if by inhuman hands. The end of it was in the shape of a lion's head and mouth. (She thought it was a very strange design but nice all the same.)

The chamber doors swung open. Oh, so it could be opened after all. Well, Peter had to have gotten out somehow. Maybe King Edmund had locked them in last night. She couldn't imagine what motive he could possibly have had for doing such a thing, but really what other explanation was there?

The said King Edmund as well as little Queen Lucy walked through the doors into the room. A dryad followed them caring a golden tray of fine food.

Susan stomach rumbled. She'd been fully prepared to tell them that she'd had enough nonsense. Kidnapping her and making her share a bed with a some bear-man thing! They should be ashamed of themselves! She'd planned to demand that they take her home at once. Now, though, she thought it would be best to make demands after she'd been given some breakfast. After that she could insist that the naughty children take her back to the professor's house.

"Good morning, Susan," Edmund said cheerfully as the dryad smiled and placed the tray on the side of Susan's bed. "I trust you slept well?"

"Morning, Su." Lucy beamed at her. Then she paused for a moment. "I can call you Su, can't I?"

Susan smiled at her. She was such a sweet little thing, even if she wasn't right in the head. "Yes, of course you can."

"How was your night?" Edmund asked. (Susan thought she saw a slight twinkle in his eyes as he spoke. The cheeky little brat!)

Susan took a slip from the little silver cup of milk on the tray before looking up at him and saying, "There was someone else in here."

"I know." Edmund shrugged.

"You know?" Susan's brows frowned angrily at him.

"It was only Peter." Lucy didn't see what the big deal was. No of course she didn't. He was her brother, she was probably used to him getting ideas in his head about where he wanted to sleep and then refusing to leave when others asked him to.

"You might have warned me," Susan said severely.

"He doesn't take up much space," Edmund said coolly. "We didn't think you'd mind."

"You didn't think I would mind having a strange man I'd never met before in my bed with me?" Susan asked, her tone still very ticked off.

"But you did meet him," Lucy said cheerfully. "Just as a bear, that's all. It's still the same Peter. Just less fluffy."

Susan willed herself not to scream at them and finished her breakfast quietly. It was one night, it was over, and he had been decent enough to keep to his own side of the bed.

"You'll need some new clothes," Lucy noted, pulling out a long sharp pair of black scissors and tapping her chin with the handle thoughtfully.

"Oh that's not-" Susan figured that her old things would probably be dry by then and that she'd just put them back on before going back to the professors.

 _Sip-Snap_ Lucy opened and closed the scissors. In the middle of the two blades, a small scrap of green fabric appeared. Lucy did it again. Rather than cut the scrap in half like it should have, it made it longer and finer. Lucy kept opening and closing the scissors until she had a long green gown with a lace-up back and a charming low -but not too low- cut.

Susan just gaped at her.

Lucy held up the dress for her to see. "Do you like it?"

"How did you..." Susan reached out to touch the sleeve of the gown to see if it was real. It was.

"It's the scissors," Lucy explained, handing them to Susan. "You can try it if you want."

Seeing no reason why not to give it a try herself, Susan opened and closed the scissors. This time the fabric was cream-coloured. She kept at it, unsure of what she was making until she finished it. A white night-shirt.

She offered it to Edmund.

"It's too big for me," Edmund told her. "But it'll probably fit Peter. You can give it to him later."

"About that." Susan had finished eating and was ready to go home. "When are you taking me back to the professor's house?"

"Uh..." Edmund turned a little red in the face.

"Well?" Susan's eyes narrowed.

"You see...you can't go back...not just yet..." Edmund stammered nervously.

"Why not?" Susan demanded.

"It's hard to explain," Edmund said. "Just trust us on this."

"You'll like it here," Lucy promised.

"It's not a matter of liking it here," Susan told them.

"Are you going to marry Peter?" Lucy asked her.

Edmund quickly put his hand over Lucy's mouth. "Ha ha, little children say the craziest things don't they?" He tried to laugh it off.

"What did she just say?" Susan gasped.

"Nothing," Edmund said quickly. "Nothing at all." He glared at Lucy, "Right, Lu?"

"Well if she breaks the..." Lucy started.

"Ahem!" Edmund coughed, fixing his stern gaze on the dryad, who got the hint and quickly took Lucy's hand, leading her away with the promise of hot chocolate downstairs.

"I'm not marrying anyone," Susan said flatly. "I'm only fourteen."

"Yes, of course." Edmund awkwardly patted her on the hand, speaking in a rather patronizing tone of voice.

"I don't even _know_ him!" Susan was still in shock.

"Don't worry about it." Edmund tried to get her to calm down. "Just get dressed and we'll see you downstairs in a little bit." He picked up the tray and walked out of the room, shutting the doors behind him.

The first thing Susan did was jump up and race to the doors to make sure they weren't locked. They weren't. She wasn't a prisoner after all. If they wouldn't take her back to the professor's house, she would simply have to go on her own. She had little fear of this White Witch person. Quite frankly, she didn't think she even existed. Yes, something was wrong with Peter. And yes, he was a white bear in the day and a human at night. But that didn't mean there was really a witch, did it? Something was very wrong with this Cair Paravel place and all the people in it. What if they tried to force her to marry this high king person? Somehow she didn't think they were at all the sort of people who would do that but she decided that she mustn't take any chances.

She slipped on the green dress Lucy had made for her and secured it around the waist with a brown belt she found in the wardrobe. Then she quickly gathered up her clothes and the fur coat into a tight buddle. She hesitated at the horn and the wreath-crown. Was it really alright to take them with her? Well, they had given them to her to keep and the gold and ivory would be worth a fortune back home in England. She and her mother wouldn't have to worry about a bill for a long while. That settled it, she tossed the wreath-crown into the bundle and tied the horn to her belt.

Pulling back the curtain to see what the weather was like, Susan got quite a shock. Just the day before, it had been winter. Snow had covered everything. Today it was as if spring had come overnight. The waves on the ocean were baby blue instead of green. There wasn't a snow patch in sight anywhere.

Flowers were blooming every which way you looked. It would certainly be nicer to travel in the spring than in the cold winter, but it still made Susan feel a bit uneasy.

"There's something the matter with this place," she mumbled as she raced out the door, down the corridor, and slipped out through the first downstairs side-door she could find.

Unknown to her, in another part of Narnia, the White Witch had learned about the arrival of the daughter of Eve.

She turned to her chief of police wolf, Maugrim. "You know what to do." Her tone was as cold, hard, and smooth as ice.

Maugrim nodded, threw back his head, and let out a howl. Another wolf came running over to him.

"Come on," said Maurgrim, putting his nose to the ground, ready to hunt. "It's time to go."

The wolf followed him out of the castle, trailing only a few paces behind.

"I don't remember this way," Susan said to herself as she walked through a forest. Actually, she didn't remember a forest being there at all. The white bear had gone by it so fast that she hadn't noticed it. She hoped she wasn't too lost. It would probably take at least a week to get back. This was horrible. She suddenly wished she hadn't been in such a hurry and had used that practical brain of hers to remember to swipe some food from the kitchen before she'd left.

Suddenly, she heard a sharp howl.

Susan spun around and saw two wolves standing side by side. Their fur stood up and they bared their teeth. She let out a scream, dropped her bundle on the ground, and made a dash for a nearby tree. She only managed to get as high as the second branch, too frightened to get higher or even get a better grip.

The wolf's snapping teeth were only inches away from her dangling left foot. She knew she'd faint and fall off and be killed. Desperate for help, she fumbled to unfasten the horn from her belt and brought it to her lips.

A rich deep sound echoed across all of Narnia.

A few moments later, The white bear high king himself came bounding over to them. He roared and growled at the wolves.

They gashed their teeth at him.

"What do you think you're doing?" The white bear demanded.

Susan wondered if he was talking to the wolves or her. She wasn't sure which it was. Both?

"You may think you're a king, but you're going to die like the beast that you are," Maugrim hissed as he sprung at the white bear so fast that Susan felt goosebumps form on both her arms.

"Peter!" Susan screamed, feeling very afraid for him.

In his white bear form, Peter was much stronger than the wolf. In less than a minute, Maugrim lay dead and Peter's white paws were red with wolf blood.

The other wolf saw what happened, let out a whimper, and scampered back to his mistress's castle as quickly as he could manage.

After a bit, Susan came down from the tree. She felt pretty shaky approaching the white bear. "I..."

He looked at her with the saddest expression that Susan had ever seen in any living creature. Worse was the thought that she was somehow adding to this sadness. That she was hurting him.

"Just get on my back," he said softly.

She could tell from his tone that he was very disappointed in her.


	6. so much for your peace and quiet

The white bear carried Susan back to Cair Paravel. She sat quietly on his soft white back, unable to think of anything to say. She wanted to thank him for saving her and apologize for any trouble she might have caused (although it could have been avoided if they had let her go back when she'd asked them) but she found that whenever she opened her mouth to speak, nothing at all came out.

Once they reached the front doors of the castle, Queen Lucy and King Edmund rushed out to meet them.

"Are you alright?" Lucy asked anxiously.

"I'm fine," Susan managed to blurt out.

"She wasn't addressing you," Edmund said coldly, shooting Susan a glare so intense that it if she had been a very little bit younger, it would have made her cry.

"I'm a little sore. Other than that, I'm alright," the white bear high king told them, bending down so that Susan could slide off his back.

"Come on." Lucy sighed, taking Susan's hand, leaning her back into Cair Paravel's dinning room. It was time for the noon meal.

Although the meal consisted of the finest possible foods and was served on the nicest gold-rimed china plates, it was the worst meal Susan could recall ever having to sit through in her whole life. It seemed that everyone was furious with her. Even little Lucy.

The white bear didn't eat at the table with them because he couldn't really fit into any of the dinning hall chairs. He was given a golden bowl in the corner that he had to bend over like a dog to eat from.

Glancing over at him, Susan wondered if he felt uncomfortable eating like an animal when he was really a human king. She wondered if he possibly even felt embarrassed about it. A deep pang of sympathy hit her like a ton of bricks. She'd always been sort of proud, not a mean haughty proud of course, but she had a healthy level of pride in herself. She couldn't even begin to fathom how mortified she would be if she ever had to eat on all floors out of an animal's food bowl, golden or not.

Suddenly, Edmund flung his silver butter-knife on the table making a sharp _clink_. "What were you thinking?" he demanded, his angry gaze fixed on Susan.

"I was only trying to go back to the professor's house," Susan said sort of timidly. "I didn't know there'd be wolves."

"You idiot," Edmund snapped. "Those weren't just any wolves. Those were _her_ wolves!"

"What are you talking about?" Susan asked.

"Those wolves belong to the White Witch," Edmund told her. "And now one of them is dead."

"I say good riddance," Lucy said, biting loudly into a crunchy vegetable.

"Oh, I'm not saying I didn't want him dead," Edmund assured them. "I hated that stupid brute as much as anyone. But I know what the White Witch can do -I helped her do it- and angering her will only make more people suffer in the meantime."

"What do you mean 'helped her do it'?" Susan wanted to know.

Edmund got a very sad, distant look in his eyes and turned rather pale in the face. "Shortly after father died and mother went missing, Peter had to take over the family as the head; I resented him for it and got the idea that he was always bossing me and that I shouldn't have to put up with it. Once day after Peter and I had a rather nasty argument -it was my fault, I was being such a horrid little beast about everything he asked me to do- I met the witch. And I did something very wrong."

"It wasn't your fault, Ed." The white bear turned around to face them and gave his brother an understanding look. "I was too hard on you, I didn't know how to raise a family. Besides, you were too little to know any better. You were barely four years old."

"Thanks, Pete." Edmund smiled at him. "But it was my fault. I may have been little but I _did_ know better. I really did."

"What did he do?" Susan asked, feeling very much that she wasn't going to like the answer.

"I agreed to take my baby sister to her in exchange for Turkish Delight." Edmund shuddered at the memory.

"What did she want Lucy for?" Susan asked.

"Lucy meant so much to Peter that I guess the White Witch thought she could use her as bait to force him to abdicate his throne," Edmund explained. "She does get tired of waiting for it."

"Waiting for it?" Susan repeated dumbly.

"That horrible witch is just aching for a chance to over-throw Peter as king and make herself queen over all Narnia," Lucy said, finishing the food on her plate and dabbing her mouth with a napkin which she then put on the empty plate and pushed aside.

"So what happened?" Susan asked Edmund. "Did you bring Lucy to her?"

"I tried..." Edmund looked sadly at Lucy and mouthed, "Sorry," before going on. "But Peter kept catching me trying to walk out of the castle with her and since I couldn't tell him where I was going he would demand I put her back in her crib. In the end, I just went to the witch on my own without her. She was furious. She threw me in a dungeon and said she would just have to use me instead of Lucy because I was too stupid to follow simple instructions."

"But you're safe now," Susan pointed out. "How did you get away?"

"Aslan," Edmund said.

Susan didn't know who Aslan was, but as soon as she heard his name she felt giddy inside. She got that lovely rush through her veins that she often associated with a wonderful smell or a lovely bit of music.

"Who's Aslan?" Susan felt very eager to know.

"He's the one whose song sang up Narnia into existence," Lucy said, her voice completely cheerful now, any signs of anger long gone. "He gave up his life so that Edmund could be freed from the witch."

Oh, how terrible. Susan felt as thought she'd been picked up and dropped from a great height. That meant this delightful Aslan person was dead and she'd never get to meet him. Somehow she felt it was a loss worth mourning.

Lucy understood. "Oh, don't worry. He came back to life."

"How did he do that?" Susan gasped, wondering if she should dare to believe that wonderful news.

"He wasn't a traitor," Edmund explained it to her. "And he was killed on the stone table where traitors are killed. Meaning that if anyone who isn't a traitor dies there, they come back to life."

"I'm glad," Susan said, breathing a sigh of relief. "but do tell me, this Aslan...he's a man...?"

Edmund, Lucy, and the white bear all burst out laughing at the same time. They threw their heads back and wiped tears from their eyes.

"What's so funny?" Susan demanded, her face turning a bright crimson. She hated being laughed at.

"No, he's not a man," Lucy managed to gasp between bouts of laughter. "He's a Lion. The Lion. the great Lion."

"His head image is engraved on your horn," The white bear told her.

That explained the design. Susan nodded. "I see."

"We'll have Lucy tell you all about Aslan," Edmund said cheerfully, finally letting his anger towards Susan subside. "She's the one closest to him."

For the rest of the afternoon, Susan sat on a large velvet cushion in one of the royal sitting rooms listening to Lucy prattle on and on about the great Aslan. She had an awful lot to say about him and although it was very interesting, Susan began to wonder what it would take to make her shut up. In only the first twenty minutes listening to the little queen, Susan was able to picture Aslan almost perfectly in her mind. By the time an hour had passed, she knew what his voice sounded like even though she'd never heard it before.

Shortly before supper time, Susan's legs fell asleep from being tucked under her behind on the cushion for so long and she asked if Lucy might show her to a wash room where she could clean the ends of her dress which had gotten some mud caked on them. She half expected Lucy to shrug and tell her that the servants would take care of it, but she didn't. Rather she nodded and took Susan down a few flights of stairs and opened a little wooden door in a cellar like passageway.

Inside was a large sort of rusty tub of water and a few scarlet-thread clotheslines hanging from the wooden beams in the ceiling.

Susan noticed that Lucy took a small object that was obviously for juicing fruits off of a little shelf in the corner. She took a silver apple out of the pocket of a small embroidered apron that hung from the clothesline, made a strange-looking apple-juice with it and dumped a few drops into the water in the tub.

"Why did you do that?" Susan asked, crinkling her forehead in confusion.

"Peter's orders." Lucy shrugged. "He says that when we wash our clothes we ought to put the silver apple juice in the water."

Susan shrugged. To each their own. "Alright then." Because it was just Lucy there and the door was shut, she wasn't embarrassed to take off her dress and stand there in her undergarments as she tried to wash the mud (and, much to her horror, blood) stains off of the ends of the dress. However, the more she scrubbed at it, the bigger the stains seemed to get. She tried four different ways of rubbing the fabric but to no avail. No matter how hard she worked at it, she couldn't get the dress clean.

Lucy let out a light giggle. "Let me try."

"Be my guest!" Susan huffed, stepping out of the way so Lucy could put her hands into the washing water.

Lucy rubbed the ends gently, dipped the stained parts of the gown into the soapy water, and pulled it out again. When she pulled it out, Susan was amazed to see that it was perfectly clean.

"How did you do that?" Susan asked her.

"It's the scissors," Lucy explained. "I'm the one who made this dress with them, so I'm the only one who can get it clean. If I tried to wash the night-shirt you made, I'd fail just as you failed with the dress."

"Oh." Susan shrugged her shoulders again. At least it wasn't because of any fault of her own. As long as she could still clean regular clothes decently, she didn't really care.

After a grand supper that was much more enjoyable than the noon meal had been, the dryad that had carried her breakfast tray in that morning, led Susan back to her bed chambers.

"Goodnight, Milady," The dryad said as she quickly lit the fire and walked out of the room, shutting the doors behind her.

Feeling very tired from all the excitement of that day, Susan yawned and climbed into the large soft bed. She stared up at the canopy above her and let out a soft sigh as her eyelids closed and she dozed off to sleep.

About an hour later, the chamber doors opened. Susan was out cold, snoring softly into her satin and velvet pillow, so she didn't hear or see King Edmund walk in and put out the fire. After not so much as a spark was left, he crept over to the windows and made sure the curtains were all closed. He noticed a candle on Susan's bedside table. He gingerly picked it up without making a sound and blew it out as quietly as possible. With one last look around, to make sure he had not forgotten anything, Edmund nodded to himself and left the room.

Peter was standing in the corridor outside.

"All clear," Edmund whispered.

"Good." Peter took a deep breath and entered the bed chamber.

Susan had been so soundly asleep that she was more than a little irritated when a sudden sharp kick to her foot caused her to wake up. She sat up and strained her eyes to focus on the other side of the bed. Peter was asleep and was apparently having a dream about running. His leg moved and kicked her again.

"Ow!" Susan didn't care if he was asleep or not, this was unacceptable! She lifted her foot and kicked his feet back to the other side of the bed.

He woke up and muttered, "By the Lion's mane, what are you doing?"

"I could ask you the same thing," Susan said harshly.

He sat up in the bed. "I'm trying to sleep."

"So was I." Susan folded her arms across her chest.

"No one's stopping you," Peter pointed out.

"Says the boy who was kicking me like a boxing kangaroo!" Susan snapped.

"I didn't do anything," Peter insisted stubbornly.

"That does it!" Susan got up out of the bed and reached for her candle, which much to her deep annoyance, had been blown out. Fine. She'd find her way out of the room without it. She knew her way around it well enough. She ran over to the doors and tried to push them open. They wouldn't budge.

"Ugh!" She kicked the door and stormed back to the bed.

Peter was laughing.

She fought the urge to kick him again. She took some of the pillows and made a line with them through the middle of the bed.

"What are you doing?" Peter chuckled.

"If you insist on staying here, which is very unkingly of you I might add," Susan huffed, patting down the pillows to make sure they were lined up right, "you are going to stay on that side of the pillow fort and keep your cold feet off of me."

"Oh, speaking of cold, thanks for the night-shirt," Peter said.

"What are you talking about?" Susan asked.

"The one you made and left on my side of the bed... I assumed it was for me. I mean it's my size and everything." He grabbed one of the pillows off the fort.

"Hey!" Susan protested.

"That one's mine." He tossed another pillow at her head. "Here. Use this one. It's lumpy anyway."

Susan let out a grunt and fixed the pillow fort again. "Good night, keep your nightmares to yourself."

"Keep your snoring to yourself then." Peter shot back,

"I do not snore."

"You do."

"I do not!"

"Do!"

"Not!"

Someone on the floor below them banged a broom handle on his chamber ceiling. "Hey, keep it down up there!" Edmund's voice barked. "I'm trying to sleep!"

"You do too snore," Peter whisper-insisted.

"Do not," Susan whispered back. "You're a pain in the arse."

"Oh, shut up," Peter said, rolling into a comfortable ball on his side of the pillow fort.

"You shut up," Susan growled trying to get comfortable on her own side.

"Goodnight, Susan," Peter yawned.

"Goodnight, Peter."


	7. Checkmate

The next morning when Susan woke up, just like the day before, Peter was gone. They only difference was that the white night-shirt she'd made was folded up neatly on top of the pillow he had used.

"I suppose that means he plans on coming back tonight," Susan sulked to herself. She wished he'd stay in his own chamber. It was probably nicer than this one anyway.

With a heavy sigh, Susan stumbled out of bed and walked over to the washbasin propped up in the corner of room to the right of the full-length mirror. She splashed some cold water on her face and then dried it with a fluffy cotton towel. The water smelled like the silver apples, she realized. She couldn't help but wonder what was with this high king and shiny gray fruit.

She still very much wanted to go back to the professor's house even if it meant getting falsely accused of breaking the window. The thought of being scared of The Macready was laughable now. But she didn't dare take off on her own again, not after the sad look she had seen in the white bear's eyes when he'd saved her from the wolves. He'd looked at her as though she had betrayed him. Perhaps when everyone had fully recovered from yesterday, she could muster up the courage to ask them to take her back. Until then, she decided she simply must play along and keep them well-humored.

The chamber doors swung open and the dryad stood there with a golden tray in her hands. She brought it over to Susan and placed it on the bed beside her. She turned to leave, but Susan called out, "Wait."

The dryad stopped and turned back around mid-step. "Anything you need, Milady?"

"Well, I realized I don't know your name." Susan smiled at her.

The dryad smiled back. "I'm called Maplebella."

"I'm Susan."

"I know," Maplebella said. "They talk about you a lot downstairs."

"Who talks about me?" Susan was taken aback. Maybe she could finally figure out what was going on.

"Oh, everyone!" Maplebella exclaimed. "Who doesn't? The servants, the king, the queen, the high king..."

"The high king talks about me?" Susan raised an eyebrow in surprise. "What does he say?"

Maplebella looked like she was suppressing a laugh. "He says you snore very loudly, Milady."

Susan did not look pleased. "Oh yeah? Well he kicks like a mule," she retorted childishly.

"Oh, don't worry about it," Maplebella said cheerfully. "I don't think he minds as much as he pretends to. He's quite fond of you."

"You're kidding," Susan said with her mouth full of toast forgetting to swallow before she spoke.

"He likes you," Maplebella added.

Susan rolled her eyes indifferently. "I really couldn't care less whom he likes."

"You don't care for him at all?" Maplebella's face fell, making her look a little disappointed.

"What do you mean, 'care for him'?" Susan didn't understand what she could possibly be getting at. "I barely know the man. I've never even seen his face."

"Well that's good," Maplebella said randomly.

"Huh?" Susan knew she sounded sort of stupid and hated herself for it, but really what else could she have said to that? What kind of lame responce was 'well that's good'?

Maplebella turned a little red in the face. "I simply mean, it's something to look forward to," she stammered, desperately trying to think of a good subject changer. "Say, did you know he turned fifteen this year?"

"Who?" Susan frowned her brow at her in confusion.

"The high king."

"Oh, him again?" Susan was starting to get fed up with talking about Peter. Wasn't there something -anything- else the servants would talk to her about? "No, didn't know that."

"Poor boy," Maplebella said, gathering up the tray now that Susan was finished eating. "He's had a hard life. Being a bear half the time, raising his siblings, the poor thing." She paused for a moment as if letting those words sink in. "You know, he smiled for the first time in years the other day."

"What about?" Even though she pretended not to care, she was actually curious.

"You," Maplebella said, leaving before Susan could ask her what she meant by that.

After Maplebella left, Susan decided she would use Lucy's scissors (they were still in the room) to make some new clothes for herself. Nothing fancy, just maybe something comfortable to wear around the castle until they let her leave. She liked the dress Lucy had made just fine but wanted something she could wash herself when it got dirty. In a strange way she sort of missed doing chores. They were part of life's soothing routine and, without them, she felt lost.

 _Snip-snap_ Susan opened and closed the scissors. A beautiful scrap of blue-velvet appeared between the blades.

Bother! thought Susan, I wish there was some way of controlling what kind of fabric came out of this thing.

She opened and closed them again. The scrap grew even more delicate and fine. After a few moments of snip-snapping, she had what looked like the sleeve of an elegant ball gown. When she'd completely finished, there was the finest gown she could ever have imagined. Perfectly fit for queen.

"I'm not going to keep it," Susan said aloud to herself. "Of course I'm not. It's too fancy for a poor girl from Finchley to wear. But I should try it on all the same, just to see if it hangs right. Who's to say those scissors always get measurements correct? Even magical objects can't get things right all the time."

Finally having talked herself into it, she changed into the blue velvet gown. It fit perfectly as if tailored to her exact size. The gossamer sleeve's ends gently ticked her fingers.

Feeling a little bit like a small girl playing dress up, Susan was prepared to take it off and change into Lucy's green gown. It wasn't quite as fancy as this floor-length work of art was. But before she did so, she thought she'd like to see how it looked with the golden wreath-crown. She picked it up off the chair she'd left it on the night before and placed it on her head. Standing back to examine the effect in the mirror, she heard a deep rumbling sigh.

She quickly spun around and saw that Maplebella hadn't remembered to close the door behind her when she'd left the room. And standing in the open door way was the white bear high king.

"You scared me!" Susan exclaimed, putting her hand to her heart.

"Sorry," the white bear apologized almost meekly. "The door was already open..."

Susan hoped he hadn't seen her naked when she'd changed her clothes. "How long have you been there?"

"Not long," the white bear assured her. "I was just passing by."

"You didn't see...?" Susan needed to be sure.

The white bear understood. "No."

"Good." She breathed a sigh of relief.

"You look nice," he told her.

"Thanks," Susan said weakly, taking the crown off her head and placing it on the bed behind her.

"Sorry I kicked you last night, I get grumpy when I'm tired," the white bear laughed.

Susan felt a little more at ease and smiled at him. "Do I really snore?"

The white bear nodded. "Yes, yes you do."

Susan walked over to his pillow and picked up the white night shirt. "Here." She held it out for him.

The white bear sniffed it. "What, do I have B.O. or something?"

"Ew, no," Susan said. "I just thought you would want it back for when you go sleep in your own chamber tonight."

"What makes you think I'm sleeping in there?" The white bear raised a silvery-white eyebrow at her.

"Because..." Susan sighed and gave in. "You are planning on sleeping in here again tonight, aren't you?"

He nodded. "Pretty much."

"Why?" Susan asked. "Why do you have to be in here?"

"I have my reasons," the white bear said rather mysteriously.

"I give up." Susan moaned and fell backwards onto the bed.

"Susan..." the white bear said softly. "You don't...I mean...you aren't...unhappy here?"

"I want to go back," Susan told him, unable to make her voice as firm as she would have liked to. He was looking at her in that sad, lost, broken way again.

"Is there anything we could do to make you happy here?" he asked. "Anything you need?"

"It's not a matter of being happy here," Susan told him. "It's a matter of not belonging here."

"Who says you don't belong here?" He looked a little worked up now. "I think you belong here."

"You do?" Susan asked, feeling very bewildered.

"Yes."

"But I don't."

"You could," he insisted.

"I couldn't." Susan wasn't willing to give in.

"Let's talk about something else then." Peter wasn't willing to just let her go back, and as she stubbornly refused to get used to life at Cair Paravel, he was at his wit's end. He kept telling himself that she had only been there for two nights and needed more time to adjust. But what if she never adjusted? What if she tried to run away again and for some reason he wasn't able to save her...? No, he wouldn't think about that. At least not now.

"You're fifteen?" Susan reassumed the dryad's theme.

"Yes, just this past October."

"My birthday is in October as well," Susan told him. "I just turned fourteen."

"What day?" He wanted to know.

"The third." Susan shrugged.

The white bear's mouth opened in surprise. "We were born on the same day one year apart, how about that?"

"Strange coincidence," Susan agreed.

"Of course I don't think it was exactly a year," he told her. "I've a sort of idea that time in your world is different than here in Narnia, but it's close enough." The white bear looked like he was thinking about something. "Susan, how about we take a walk tonight?"

"Why tonight?" Susan asked, feeling a little surprised.

"I'd rather walk with you as myself than as a bear," he explained.

Susan didn't feel as though she could say no. "Sure, I guess so... What time should I be ready?"

"Around ten," he told her.

"Fine, I'll be ready." Susan couldn't help but wonder what he had in mind, but there is something exciting about getting up in the middle of the night and going somewhere, not knowing exactly what is going to happen, even to a practical person like Susan, the notion had a certain unexplainable allure.

That night, Peter in his human form walked into the throne room where Edmund and Lucy were playing chess.

"Why are you all dressed up?" Edmund asked, eyeing his fancy tunic and noticing he was wearing his good boots.

"I'm going for a walk," Peter explained.

"What about Susan?" Lucy asked.

"She's coming with me," Peter told her.

Edmund dropped his pawn on the floor and was too shocked to bother to pick it up. "Are you sure that's such a good idea?"

"It's an eclipsed moon tonight, Ed," Peter said, picking up the pawn and handing it to Lucy who placed it back on the board.

"Which makes this okay, _how_?" Edmund demanded.

"No moonlight, you and Lucy will put out all the lamps and fires, she wont see my face any more than she would in the bed chamber," Peter explained this calmly and slowly knowing they were concerned.

"I think it's risky," Edmund said, glaring at Lucy because he thought she'd cheated by putting his pawn back on the board in the wrong place.

"I think it's romantic," Lucy said, capturing Edmund's rook.

"There's nothing romantic about it," Edmund insisted, moving his knight to protect his king from Lucy's rook. "If she sees you..."

"She wont," Peter assured him. "And besides, maybe she feels a little strange sleeping in the same bed with someone she knows nothing about. I thought a nice walk and conversation would make her feel more at ease."

"Nothing in the world is going to make that girl feel at ease." Edmund rolled his eyes as Lucy's pawn captured his bishop.

"If she marries you, does that make her high queen, or is she just a regular queen?" Lucy wondered aloud, as she moved her knight dangerously close to Edmund's queen.

"Lucy, don't get your hopes up," Peter said calmly. "This isn't about marriage. This is about her breaking the spell and saving Narnia. After that, she might just go back where she came from. Remember what I told you about mother's stories of children from that other world? Polly and Digory went back."

"Well, from what Aslan told me last time we met," Lucy said, letting Peter's words sink in but not really agreeing with them. "The girl that breaks the spell will be more than worthy to marry you."

"That doesn't mean she will," Peter reminded her.

Lucy shrugged, capturing Edmund's queen with her bishop. "I hope you do marry her through, I think I'd like her for a sister. She's nice."

"Ed," Peter leaned and whispered into his brother's ear, "you didn't tell anyone that I said I thought Susan was pretty did you?"

"Of course not," Edmund whispered back in a shocked voice. "It's in the vault."

Through the air vents, they could hear the servants going to bed downstairs.

"I think the high king really likes this girl, Edmund said Peter told him he thought she was divinely beautiful," one of the servant's voices traveled up the vent.

Peter raised an eyebrow at his brother.

"Alright, so I exaggerated a bit." Edmund turned red in the face and cringed.

"Check mate!" Lucy cried out, putting his king in permanent check.

"You know, you are really lucky, I need your help tonight and can't kill you," Peter growled at him.

"Lucky me." Edmund sighed looking down at the lost game of chess in front of him.


	8. A very close call

Susan sat fully dressed on the corner of the bed, waiting for Peter to arrive. She smoothed out the dress she was wearing. It wasn't anything new or special, just the same green gown Lucy's scissors had made. She'd considered making a new gown but decided not to, knowing she would die of embarrassment if more velvet cloth came out of it. She couldn't imagine walking around the castle in the dead of night decked out in ballroom attire. The very thought made her face feel hot and her cheeks turn scarlet.

She wondered what was going to happen. What would they talk about? Just why did she feel so nervous? Would he come on time or be fashionably late? Why did he want to take this walk in the first place? Wasn't it rather random? He had said he'd rather walk with her as a human than a bear, did that mean she would actually see what he looked like? Or maybe not? But wasn't such a large castle with so many servants bound to have good lighting so that no one got lost at night?

Remembering his panic when she'd tried to light a fire that first night, she was rather surprised that he would be willing to enter her chamber when the fireplace was so brightly lit, crackling softly sending sweet lovely warmth through the whole room.

The door opened and indeed there was a young king standing there. And yes, Susan could see his face clearly in the fire's glow. It was familiar. Too familiar. It wasn't the white bear king at all. It was only Edmund, walking in without even bothering to knock or greet her. He went to the fire and put it out.

"Have you got any lit candles in this room?" Edmund asked her.

"W-w-what?" Susan blurted out, taken aback by the stern, almost frightened, tone he spoke to her with.

He repeated himself even more sternly this time not because he was cross but because of he was concerned, still unsure if this was a good idea. He didn't think his brother should toy with fate so to speak. Why should Peter so calmly risk losing what could be his only chance to be freed from his enchantment for ever? Well, risk or not, as far as it depended on Edmund, nothing bad would happen.

"Yes," Susan told him, reaching for the little candle in the copper holder on her nightstand. "Right here."

"Give me that," Edmund ordered a bit too sharply as he reached out for the holder.

"Here, take it." Susan didn't know what he was so worked up about. If he wanted the candle so badly, he could have taken it at any time. After all, this was his castle more than it was hers. She handed it to him willingly.

Edmund took it and carried it out of the room.

From behind the closed doors, Susan heard Peter's voice say, "Is that the only lit candle in there?"

"Yes," Edmund's voice answered. There was the sound of blowing. "And now it's out."

Satisfied, the high king opened the chamber doors and walked it. The room was nearly pitch black and just like the nights before, all Susan could see of him was his faint outline. His face was still a perfect blank, thanks to the dark shadows from the corner in which he stood.

"Hullo," he said politely.

"Hullo," Susan answered back, standing up and following him out the door, feeling curiously shy all of a sudden.

They wandered down the dark hallways that never got even a little lighter. Not a single candle holder contained a flame. No fireplaces were lit. No lamps burned. Susan felt a sudden longing for the comfort of one of her father's old electric torches. She'd brought one with her to the professor's house but of course hadn't taken it with her into the wardrobe.

Just the sort of thing that would have come in handy here too, Susan thought mournfully to herself, at this point I'd be glad even for one single match if it could be guaranteed to light.

Susan wasn't scared of the dark. She was much too practical and sensible for that. Even at the young tender age years and years ago when her parents had expected her to fear her lightless bedroom at night, she wasn't afraid. But here in this strange place her sensibleness told her that any sort of creature from a harmless talking rabbit to a hungry and dangerous minotaur might be waiting in the dark pathways. She was glad Peter was there with her. Even though she found him to be nothing but a guilt tripping bear in the day and a pest at night, she was pleased to have him with her now. No one in that castle would be likely to just jump out at their high king and that kept most of her fears quietly at bay.

Suddenly a door opened and even though no outside light entered, the feel of cool outdoor night air gently tapped them in the faces. Susan knew they must be out in the royal gardens now. But it was still so dark! What was wrong with this place?

"Why is it so dark?" Susan finally gave in and flat out asked him.

"No moon tonight," Peter told her. "It's one of those extended eclipse things that happens every twenty years or so."

"So, this is nice." Susan hated herself for not thinking of anything else to say.

"Yes, fresh air is good." Peter came up with. _Fresh air is good? What the heck is that? What was I thinking? Where's my kingly wit and grace when I need it?_

"I've noticed the apples on the trees here aren't like the silver ones in the washroom and in the windows." Susan figured now might be a good time to ask about some things. It was better to sound nosy than to sound stupid, she decided.

It was true that the apples weren't the same in the garden. You didn't even have to see then to figure that out. Just the smell wasn't quite the same. Yet, Peter felt a tad nervous as if she had somehow been able to see through the darkness and seen them -maybe even seen _him_. No, anyone might have seen the apples in the day from the window of her chamber. It wasn't anything to worry about. It would be best just to give her a straight answer on that one.

"That's because the silver apples come from the tree Aslan called up," Peter explained. "But it's been a little weaker as of late. All it needs is one good storm to knock it over." He shuddered at the thought.

"What's so important about them?" Susan wanted to know. "I mean, they're pretty, but what's their purpose?"

"The White Witch hates them," Peter told her. "She ate one once and has hated them ever since. The smell makes her sick."

"So is that why you put apple juice in the water?" Susan asked. "To keep her away?"

Peter shrugged his shoulders and sighed, "Better safe than sorry."

"I see," Susan said quietly.

"I can't wait until I'm freed from being a bear." Peter sighed, his voice lonely and distant sounding.

"When will that be?" Susan asked him.

"It depends on a lot of things," Peter said, gently reaching out and touching her arm in a compassionate way. "I can't explain it to you now, but someday -Aslan willing- you'll be able to know and understand."

Now Susan was glad of the dark, for it meant he couldn't see her blush. She wasn't sure why she was blushing. It wasn't as if there was any reason for it, but all the same, she could feel her cheeks flushing and hated to think of how unbecoming it would look if not for the dark night. He stopped touching her and Susan felt her cheeks return to normal.

"Some day," Peter said wistfully, "I'm going to be able to go out riding with Lu and Ed mid-afternoon, on my own horse instead of running beside them on all four paws. There's nothing wrong with being a bear, I know several nice talking bears. I'm not ashamed of it. There's nothing wrong with being a bear, expect that is, if you aren't really one."

Susan felt sorry for him. He was deeper than she gave him credit for. There was so much in life he had probably missed out on. There were probably a hundred things he longed to do.

"How long have you been a polar bear during the day?" She asked, as they walked around back into what she assumed was indoors because the air wasn't as cold and the ground felt different under her feet. More like wood and pile, less like earth.

"Since I was a baby." Peter said, almost sullenly. "Jadis heard that I was to be a great high king and that I would bring about her end...or something like that...I'm not really sure what it was exactly. Some sort of promise or prophecy from Aslan. A blessing, mother used to call it."

They turned a corner and Susan wondered what part of the castle they were in. Because she could barely see anything due to lack of light, she couldn't tell if it was somewhere she had been before or not.

"Anyway," Peter went on, "Jadis stormed the castle and cursed me into being a white bear half the time. Father once told me that mother slapped her across the face. What I wouldn't give to have been old enough to remember seeing _that_!"

Susan smiled and let out a polite chuckle. She felt her feet going up a staircase now. She reached for a place where she assumed a railing would be. There wasn't one. There was a sickly moment of almost falling before Peter caught her by the waist and helped her to her feet.

"Careful, there's no railing there." He stated what was now obvious.

Susan didn't answer him. She was too busy trying to will herself not to blush again.

Up ahead of them, unknown to Peter, there was a candle left burning. One of the older servants, a faun who was hard of hearing. thought he had been told to, 'Please leave any candles in the corridor' when really the order had been, 'please _do not_ leave any candles in the corridors."

Thinking he was following the command of the king, the poor faun had left his candle on one of the lower lamp stands in the corridor that Susan and Peter were now approaching.

For a moment Susan blinked in the twinkling light, trying to adjust her eyes to the sudden brightness after being in the dark for so long.

Peter gaped at the candle in panicked disbelief. This wasn't happening! He had been careful to tell all of the servants to keep all of the passageways as dark as possible. Edmund had been right. He'd taken a foolish risk and would now pay the price. If she saw him...no, he wouldn't let that happen. Not when there was something he could do to stop it.

As soon as Susan turned to look at him, He covered his face with his hands and twisted his neck away from her. All she saw of him was the back of his neck, some of his hair, and part of an earlobe.

She wondered why he'd done that. What was wrong? Why didn't he want to be seen? "Peter, are you alright?"

His voice came back strong and determined. "I will be."

Still facing away from her, he let go of his face with one hand having to rely on only the one to keep it hidden. He put his hand right on the wick of the candle. It put out the light, but it also left a thick bubbling burn in the center of his palm.

He let out a sharp cry of pain before taking a deep breath, regaining composure, and saying, "Now I'm alright."

"What was that about?" Susan gasped, completely in shock over what she had witnessed.

"Haven't you guessed?" Peter said softly, trying not to think about how much his hand hurt. He would just run it under some cold water later, Lucy would probably make a fuss and bandage it, everything would be fine. And best of all, he wouldn't have lost his chance to be freed from the White Witch's spell. "I can't let you see my human face."

So was that what Maplebella had been referring to? Susan wondered. Out loud she said, "Why not?"

Peter let out a groan. "I can't tell you. But Susan, you have to trust me, please. Something terrible will happen if you should ever look upon my human face."

She gaped at him in the darkness wondering what to say. What could she possibly say to that? What sort of 'terrible' did he mean? Did he mean humorous terrible? Or terrible terrible? He couldn't have meant funny terrible, he was too worked up for that.

"Let's go back," Peter said dejectedly. This walk was officially over. Supposing there were other lit candles further in, even though she now knew she wasn't to look at his face when he was in his human form, how could she help seeing him accidentally if they should walk passed a burning lamp? No, it was far too risky.

"Back to the bed chamber?" Susan asked to be sure.

"Yes," Peter said, turning around causing his boots to make a slight squeak on the tiles.

"Alright then," Susan said quietly.

They didn't say another word to each other until they'd returned to the bedchamber.

Peter let out a yawn, took off his boots, changed out of his tunic and into the white night-shirt, and climbed into his side of the bed. "Good night, Susan."

"Good night, Peter." Susan decided that she'd rather sleep in her clothes than change with him in the room. It didn't matter that it was probably too dark for him to see anything. She simply could not -would not- take off her clothes with him there. If she'd been less worn out from trying to understand what was really going on in Cair Paravel, she might have thought to slip into the wardrobe and change there. As it was, the thought didn't cross her mind and the only thing she changed out of was her shoes.

She lay perfectly still, flat on her back in the bed, staring up at a teeny rip in the canopy through which she could see a little bit of the ceiling.

A while later, she heard Peter say something. She was surprised that he was still up. She'd thought he'd fallen asleep hours ago.

"No more tea for me, thanks," Peter's muffled voice slurred.

"What was that?" Susan asked him.

"Edmund, put it away. You're going to poke someone's eye out with that thing." He moaned. "No Lucy, you cannot play with my sword, put it back where you found it."

 _He talks in his sleep!_ Susan realized, feeling slightly amused. Apparently, he only did this sometimes because he hadn't said a word in his sleep in the past two nights.

He prattled on for a few moments about measurements for the marble staircase in the east wing of the castle before rolling over, letting out a groan and proceeding to spend the rest of the night in silence.

Susan tried not to laugh. It really wasn't all that funny. Oh who was she kidding? It was downright hilarious!

And to think, Susan thought to herself, he finds my snoring disturbing!

Shortly before morning, Peter woke up, quietly left the bed chamber, and went into the throne room.

Edmund was waiting for him there. "How did it go?"

"We had a close call, but it's alright," Peter told him, lifting up his hand to show him the burn.

Edmund looked up at his brother. His hair was white instead of blond. Which meant that in less than an hour the sun would come up and he would turn back into a white bear. "You should have been more careful."

"I know," Peter agreed with a nod.

"Alright, let's see if we can do something about your hand before it turns into a paw," Edmund said as they walked out of the throne room side by side.

"Thanks, Ed."

"Don't mention it."


	9. In which, something bad happens

The next morning was just like every other morning in Cair Paravel before it. Susan woke up alone in the bed, Peter's night shirt was neatly folded up on his pillow, and Maplebella waked in with a golden tray for her breakfast.

"How was your walk with the high king last night?" she wanted to know.

Susan rather liked Maplebella, little as she knew her. She was a harmless, friendly little soul who enjoyed gossip, but only the nice kind, not the mean kind. She didn't speak much to most people unless they took the first step and spoke to her first. Because Susan had gone out of her way to ask her name, Maplebella felt comfortable talking to her and even bringing up subjects with out being asked. Which was something that surprised her fellow servants.

When asked about it, she'd always just shrugged and said, "She's easy to talk to. Not quite as friendly as our little Queen Lucy, but then, who is?" Before going back to whatever it was she happened to be doing at the time.

"It was fine," Susan said as Maplebella walked over to her with the tray. "He did get rather anxious when we passed a lit candle."

Maplebella gasped and accidentally dropped the tray on the floor. All the food fell onto the rug and all the drink spilled out in a messy puddle on the floor.

"I'm so sorry, milady," she said, her tone bordering on hysterical as she bent down to clean up the mess.

"Here, let me help," Susan offered, climbing out of bed and picking up the bread rolls and muffins that had rolled to the other side of the chamber.

"Milady, don't bother with that," Maplebella said kindly, talking the rolls out of Susan's arms and putting them back on the tray. "I'll clean up here, if you go downstairs to the dinning hall now, you can eat with the kings and queen. They can't be finished just yet."

"Are you sure I can't help?" Susan asked her.

"Oh bless me, yes!" Maplebella said good-naturedly. "I'm the servant, you're the lady, you go downstairs and eat with the others now, there's a good miss."

Susan nodded and turned to leave.

"Milady..." The dryad's voice called back anxiously.

"Yes?"

"You didn't see his face last night, did you?"

"No, he put out the candle with his hand before I could catch a glimpse of him," Susan explained.

Maplebella let out a sigh of relief. "I might have guessed it. The high king is still safe. We all are."

"What do you mean?" Susan asked incredulously.

"There now, don't you worry about it," she said in a patronizing tone, giving her a light pat on the shoulder. "Just go down and have breakfast."

Downstairs, Edmund was guzzling down toasted bread as though there was no tomorrow.

"Narnia's not going to run out of toast, Ed," Lucy joked, smiling at her brother from across the table.

Edmund smiled back but continued to eat as though he hadn't heard her. He reached for another piece of toast, smeared it in butter, and stuffed it in his mouth.

The white bear high king was eating from his golden bowl on the floor again. He looked up when he heard someone coming.

"I hope it's the kitchen staff with the jam," Edmund grumped. "What do you have to do to get a decent jar of preserves at the breakfast table?"

"Not much of a morning person, are you, Ed?" The white bear teased.

"You have egg on your nose," Edmund retorted.

The white bear reached up and tried to wipe it off with his paw but it was bandaged and he couldn't quite lift it all the way up.

"Here, I'll get it," Lucy got a napkin and cleaned it off.

"Thanks, Lu," Peter said gratefully.

"Good morning." Susan entered the room.

"Good morning, Su," Lucy practically sang, her voice its typical sunshine-like timbre.

"What are you doing here?" Edmund asked, his mouth full of toast again. "Didn't anyone bring you your breakfast?"

"Yes, they did..." Susan tried to explain. "But well there was...an accident...is it alright if I eat with you?"

"Sure," Lucy said brightly, pulling out the chair next to her own. "Have a seat."

"Thank you, Lu." Susan smiled at Lucy as she took her seat.

"Well I hope you don't want jam because there isn't any," Edmund barked loudly enough for the servants to hear.

A dwarf came in with a couple jars of grape preserves and placed them on the table. "Here you are, your majesty."

"So what are you doing today?" the white bear asked his siblings.

"I was thinking of going riding," Edmund grunted, struggling to get one the jam jars open.

"Susan, have you ever gone riding?" Lucy asked her, taking the jar from Edmund and getting it open first try.

"I loosened it!" Edmund sulk-retorted to Peter whose white shoulders were shaking with laughter over what he'd just seen.

"I've only ridden once at a fair when I was twelve," Susan recalled, as she peeled a piece off the bottom of a muffin and placed it in her mouth.

"Well that's unacceptable," the White bear laughed. "You should be taught to ride."

"I can teach her," Lucy offered.

Edmund let out a snort of disapproval as he smeared yet another piece of toast with the jam and didn't think twice about licking his sticky fingers when he had finished. "You fall off your horse constantly." He looked over at Susan. "I'll teach her."

"Good idea," The white bear said approvingly.

"When?" Susan asked, feeling strangely excited.

"How does after breakfast sound?" the white bear asked her.

"It sounds good," Susan said, scooping some scrambled eggs onto her plate.

"Well that settles it then," the white bear said decidedly. "After we finish up, Ed will show you to the stables and teach you how to ride."

Cair Paravel's stable was not like any stable Susan had ever seen or heard of before. Some of the horses were regular horses that you might find at any good breeding farm. But others were so strange! Three were winged; six were unicorns. One was even a winged unicorn! This would have been strange enough if all of the animals were somewhat horse-like, but there were also a few griffins and a dragon or two. Susan couldn't look at the dragons for too long. Something about their gleaming ruby-coloured eyes made her feel uneasy.

Some of the smaller horses had a more intelligent look in their eyes than the others did.

"Those are talking horses," Edmund told her. "They live here but we don't really ride them except in emergencies. Other than Phillip that is." He reached over the padlock and patted the horse's chestnut brown flank.

"He's lovely," Susan said politely.

"Thank you," The horse said, tossing his head proudly.

"You can ride Snowdrop." Edmund motioned to a stately mare with a gleaming white coat and a butter-gold mane and tail. "She can't talk but Lucy says she's a great listener."

Susan gazed at the gorgeous horse and lifted her hand towards it's soft velvet muzzle. "Can I touch her?"

"Sure, go ahead." Edmund shrugged.

"Hullo, aren't you nice..." Susan cooed, stroking the horse's soft face and planting a little kiss on her nose.

"Ready to take her out?" Edmund asked, an amused smirk forming on his face.

"Sure." Susan beamed.

Edmund opened the padlock and walked the horse out. Susan grabbed a brush from a silver rack that was hanging nearby. Before she could use it however, one of the stable-hand fauns took it away from her and brushed the horse himself. Then two other fauns came and put on the mare's saddle and bridle.

"Thank you," Susan said as Edmund gave her a lift up onto the horse.

"Well they didn't remember the step-ladder," he said, winking at the fauns. Susan realized that Edmund teased the help as a sort of inside joke and that none of them really minded it.

Edmund climbed up on Phillip's back.

"Wait!" Lucy came running towards them carrying a satchel of silver apples in one hand and a small note in the other. She rushed over to Edmund and handed the note over to him.

Edmund unfolded it, read it, and nodded. "Alright then." He folded it back up and put it in his doublet pocket.

"What did it say?" Susan asked, forgetting that most notes passed between the castle folk were none of her business.

Edmund answered her anyway. "It's from Peter," he explained. "He's just telling us what places to avoid on our ride and how far we should and should not go. Also he wants us to put a couple of silver apples in our saddle-bags just in case."

Lucy lifted up her satchel and Edmund took out four apples. He tossed two of them to Susan. She caught one in her hands but the other bounced off her lap onto the floor behind her. One of the fauns picked it up and handed it back to her. She thanked him politely.

The ridding lesson went smoothly. To say that Susan enjoyed herself immensely would be a gross understatement. Ridding turned out to be one of those things that came almost natural to her. Edmund only had to instruct her to use her knees more and loosen her grip on the reins just a little bit. The rest she was able to pick up on her own. Edmund didn't have to tell her to sit up straight. She had perfect posture because of ballet classes she'd taken before the war came and made her family poor, not to mention single-parent.

While they rode along beautiful hilly green slopes and down lovely pathways with cool shady willow trees, Edmund told Susan wonderful stories about Narnia. Most of them having to do with his parents. In one story there was a boy named Digory and a girl named Polly. She would have never guessed that Digory was now the old professor she was staying with.

Speaking of which, Susan still planned to go back. All this time, though she had to admit she was starting to grow rather fond of them all, she'd only been humoring everyone. Playing along so to speak. She realized now that she could ride back to where she came from, dismount, and go right back through the wardrobe. She very nearly did, but each time she tried she couldn't bring herself to go through with this plan.

The first time, Edmund asked her why she was facing that direction when they were meant to be going the other way. She couldn't bring herself to admit the truth. She simply said it was a mistake and turned her horse to follow his.

The second time she thought self-consciously of her clothing and how Katie and Simon would laugh if she raced out of the spare room dressed like she was about to star in a school play. And how she really would need to get her old clothing back before making a get away.

The third time she decided that laugh though they might, this might be her only chance to get back and that she really mustn't miss it. But then she thought of little Queen Lucy who would surely be quite sad that she hadn't even said goodbye. Dear little Lu. And then the thought of the white bear's sad eyes came to mind and she realized she would need to say goodbye to him too. She wasn't sure she could live with herself if Edmund had to return home without her and explain it all to Lucy and the white bear. No, she couldn't do that. She must humor them just a little longer and _then_ say a proper goodbye and leave.

When the sun rose high in the sky, Edmund stomach let out a rumble. Time for the noon meal. "We'd best be heading back to the castle now."

"Very well then," Susan agreed, speeding up a little so they were riding side by side rather than with Edmund in the front and her trailing behind.

Once they reached the castle, they noticed that something must be very wrong. They could hear wailing and murmurs of fear coming from the servants. The fauns, which had been so dapple-eyed and cheerful that morning, were now dismal and frightened looking. The talking horses were weeping and the unicorns were pounding their hooves on the ground.

"What's happened?" Susan gasped, as her horse came to a stop in front of the fauns who helped her down but looked at her differently than they had before.

One of them refused to help her at all but stood with his arms folded across his chest. Edmund threatened to put him in the dungeon if he didn't show some respect towards the guest of the high king.

"I'm sorry, your majesty," he said coldly. "I mean no disrespect to you or your brother, only to her. This her fault! The dryad was my friend and it's this wench's fault that she's gone."

"What does he mean?" Susan asked.

No one bothered to answer her. Edmund only looked very sad and faintly whispered, "The White Witch was here, wasn't she?"

They nodded.

"She attacked us?" Edmund asked them.

They shook their heads. "Not all of us, your majesty."

Susan felt fear griping her heart. How could the witch have come? What about the silver apples? Had they just stopped working all of a sudden?

"She didn't take prisoners, did she?" Edmund asked.

"No, she hasn't been able to do that since Aslan called up the new tree as you know, though it's weaker today than it was when it was first sprouted," they told him.

"What happened?" Susan asked again.

" _You_ happened!" The faun who wouldn't help her sneered.

"Ahem!" Edmund glared at him.

"Forgive me, your majesty," he said meekly.

"We lost someone, a dryad," one of the fauns informed Edmund.

Edmund dismounted. "Show me."

Susan followed Edmund and the fauns out into the courtyard where the white bear, Lucy, and a large number of servants were standing around something looking very mournful indeed. Many of them were weeping steadily. Lucy's face was tear-stained as she rushed over to Susan and threw her arms around her waist.

"Oh, Lu," Susan said softly, trying to comfort the little girl. "What's happened?"

"It's terrible," Lucy mumbled, crying too hard to talk very clearly.

Edmund unwrapped Lucy's arms from Susan's middle and ordered that some of the servants take her inside and give her something to eat.

"Edmund, I can't eat," Lucy protested. "I'm too sad. This is horrible. Whatever will we-"

"Not eating won't change what's happened." Edmund said kindly. "You'll need to keep up your strength. Go inside, sister dear."

Lucy nodded, wiped some more tears from her cheeks, and allowed herself to be led out of the courtyard.

As they finally made their way through the crowd, Susan saw what all the fuss was about. In the very middle of the courtyard stood a stone statue of a dryad. It looked exactly like Maplebella. Her mouth was open as if she was pleading or screaming.

The white bear high king was there amongst all the sobbing servants. There was a small piece of paper in his mouth. He walked over to Edmund who took it from him.

"The witch left that," The white bear told him. "I didn't see her come, no one did. Except poor Maplebella that is."

Edmund unfolded the note and read it aloud. " _An eye for an eye_."

"I didn't know she cared for Maugrim so much that she'd avenge him," The white bear whispered in a tone that suggested that whatever had happened didn't really have anything to do with the dead wolf in spite of what the note said.

"She's only trying to scare us, Pete." Edmund struggled to remain calm.

Suddenly Susan understood what must have happened. The White Witch had come and turned poor Maplebella into stone. Also she felt horribly guiltly because Peter had killed Maugrim to save her. If she hadn't run away that first time, Maplebella might still be alive now.

"Well it's working," The white bear told him. "It's working all too well; the servants are in panic."

"They'll calm down." Edmund tried to reassure them.

"They might not." The white bear shook his head sadly. "Don't you understand, Edmund? Jadis is smart. She's trying to turn then against Susan so she can't save us!"

"What?" Susan gasped.

"Don't you get it?" Edmund cried, turning to her now with a pleading expression on his face. "You're the one who can stop all of this."

"Me?" Susan took a step back and shook her head. "No. You must be mistaken."

"There's no mistake," The white bear told her. "You're meant to save us."

She couldn't believe this. Save them? Her? From a powerful witch that could turn people to stone? No, she couldn't do that! How could she possibly do anything of the sort?

"But if they're against her now..." Edmund looked worried.

The white bear let out a roar. Everyone stopped mid-sob and looked at him.

"My loyal subjects," he addressed them. "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Be brave. This suffering is only temporary. Soon we will all be freed."

"Not by her!" A male dryad cried out angrily, point his long branchy index finger at Susan. (He was Maplebella's father.)

"Yes, by her." The white bear growled. "If anyone does not treat her with respect and kindness as long as she is living in my kingdom, under my roof, they will be tried as traitors against the Narnian crown. That is final."

Susan stood off to the side, gaping at him. She didn't know what to do or say. She didn't want them to hate her. But she didn't want them to be kind to her because they were frightened either.

"I wont serve her," Maplebella's mother called out. "It's her fault I've lost my daughter. My dear Maplebella was friends with her and look how that turned out!"

"Is this open treason?" The white bear asked severely, bearing his teeth at her.

"No, my king." She hung her head and took a step back.

The white bear nodded. "That's what I thought." He looked over at Edmund. "Take Susan back inside to her chambers, I'll have something brought up for her noon meal."

"Come on, Su." Edmund said softly.

"Do you hate me?" Susan couldn't help but ask. "I didn't mean for any of this to happen..."

"I don't hate you," Edmund assured her in such a genuinely kind voice that she almost burst into tears when she heard him speak.

"Why not?" Susan asked him.

"Because, I understand what it's like to be considered a traitor by your own people," he said, putting a sympathetic hand on her shoulder. "I understand how you feel right now all too well."

"You think I'm a traitor then?" Susan said.

"No." Edmund shrugged. "I don't. I just understand what it's like to feel like one, that's all."


	10. growing closer

Susan sat on the window seat of her chamber, looking out at the apple orchard which she assumed was where she and Peter had been walking last night. She wasn't thinking about Peter at that moment, though. Her thoughts were with the stone dryad.

She realized now that she couldn't leave Cair Paravel and go back to the professor's house. The Narnians needed her. She didn't know how to help or protect them but she had to try to help somehow.

If she left, would more innocent people become victims like Maplebella? Peter and Edmund seemed to think so. That settled it. She was staying. She would find a way to save her new friends, she just had to.

"I suppose that's it then," she whispered softly to herself.

The door opened a crack and Susan saw a black nose popping in. It was the white bear. He pushed his way into the room and walked over to her. There was a golden serving tray full of food on his back.

Susan reached over, picked it up, and placed it on the little bedside table.

"How are you holding up?" he asked her.

"As well as can be expected, thank you," Susan said almost coldly although she didn't mean to sound so distant nor so angry. She wasn't mad at Peter. It was the White Witch she was furious with. How dare she just come in and destroy someone who had never done her any harm?

"You're safe here," the white bear promised her. "I wont let anything happen to you."

"But what am I supposed to do?" Susan asked him.

"What do you mean?" The white fur on his forehead crinkled in confusion.

"How do I save the Narnians?" she wanted to know. "Whatever it is, I'll do it."

"You don't have to do anything," Peter told her. "You just have to live here at Cair Paravel."

"What good does that do?" Susan snapped, feeling rather irritated.

"Look outside." He pointed his nose towards the window.

"What about outside?" She didn't understand what he was getting at.

"It's spring," he explained, his black bear-lips turning up into a smile.

"Yes..." Susan wondered what was so great about spring.

"Before you came to live here it was always winter," he told her. "Ever since I was five years old, it's been winter here in Narnia. I used to think that nothing could ever make the snow melt and the flowers come back. And then you came. The day after, I woke up and all the snow was gone. Everything was in bloom. Birds were singing. People were rejoicing."

"So just by living here, I make things better?" Susan asked with an, 'are you pulling my leg?' expression on her face.

"You ran away the day after, you must have seen it wasn't snowing then," the white bear pointed out.

"It's my fault that she's gone, isn't it?" Susan said softly blinking back the tears that were reforming in her eyes.

"No, don't blame yourself for that one." He rested his head against her shoulder to comfort her. "The witch would have found some other excuse to threaten us. She's only trying to make it hard for you here so you'll leave."

"How long do I have to stay?" Susan asked, reaching for the crystal wine goblet on the golden tray.

"I can't tell you that." He sighed, lifting up his head now.

"You mean, you don't know?" Susan turned to face him.

"No, I mean what I said, simply that I can't tell you," he huffed.

"Well there's no need to get so worked up," Susan huffed back, taking a sip of the wine.

"I'm not," he lied.

"Yes you are," Susan retorted.

"I'll just leave you to eat in peace." The white bear decided, walking out of the chamber.

That evening, there was a memorial service for Maplebella. Susan returned Lucy's scissors and she made black mourning dresses, veils, and tunics for everyone to wear.

Everyone stood in the cool-air of the rich purple twilight that filled the pear orchard (Maplebella had been a peach-tree dryad) with somber broken-hearted expressions on their faces. Those who had known Maplebella well made speeches about her life. Her parents talked about things she had done as a little girl and what a sweet good-natured child she had been.

Feeling lower than dirt, Susan stood away from the main crowd next to the thickest trees, not caring if her long black petticoats got snagged by branches. Lucy left the crowd to stand by her side and hold her hand, a gesture that Susan couldn't help but feel touched by. They stood quietly listening and crying together.

Edmund was in the mist of the crowd keeping everything in order and seeing to it that the next speaker was announced when the currently talking servant finished their speech. He had a lot to attend to on his own as Peter wasn't anywhere to be seen. He would be turning back into a human for the night very soon.

Just as the sun was setting and the ceremonies were being wrapped up in favor of everyone going inside, having supper, and getting some sleep, Susan happened to look over at a certain circle of trees a few feet behind her.

For a moment she thought she saw the white bear roaming about, though she couldn't quite be sure because the lighting was getting dimmer and dimmer, turning from purple to black slowly but steadily. Her last glimpse of the bear made her wonder if she had seen him at all. Because looking over to his place, she saw, not a polar bear, but a man with snowy white hair. He wasn't facing her direction and as has been mentioned, the lighting was bad. Thus she didn't see his face.

"Lucy," she whispered to the teary-eyed little girl who was still clinging tightly onto her right hand.

"Did you happen to see a man with white hair wandering about over there?"

"No," Lucy admitted, looking over to the place Susan motioned to and seeing that there was no longer anyone there. "But it must have been Peter."

"Peter has white hair?" Susan asked in deep surprise. "From the glimpse she'd caught before he'd put the candle out, she'd thought his hair was blond.

"Only for the first hour or so before he turns from human to bear or from bear to human," Lucy explained. "Then it goes back to it's normal colour."

"I see," Susan said, as they started to walk back towards the castle. "Why do you suppose he doesn't let us see his face?"

"I've seen his face." Lucy shrugged. "It's only you who's not allowed to. The servants and Edmund see him all the time."

"Why is that?" Susan asked her.

Lucy shrugged again. "I can't tell you. Don't worry about it. Just trust us on this one."

No pain lasts for ever and the anguish of the servants over losing their companion faded with the passing of time. They stopped being distant toward Susan and became kind to her again. Even Maplebella's parents came to like her a great deal.

Susan found that she could be happy at Cair Paravel after all. Edmund and Lucy were good-as-gold as far as company went. They always kept her entertained and let her borrow whatever she wanted from them. Many times, Lucy allowed Susan to use the scissors to make more dresses for herself (and not all of them turned into velvet ball gowns, much to Susan's relief) and Edmund loaned her books from his personal library so she could keep up with her studies. As for Peter, she grew to like him quite a bit too. Although it took her a while to admit it, she felt lonely when he wasn't around.

At night she no longer was sleeping when he arrived. She was simply laying still with her eyes closed, unable to fall asleep until she felt the give in the mattress and heard the familiar breathing of the high king. Then she could doze off. Sometimes he figured out that she was awake and talked to her. The first time he did this, she didn't answer him assuming that he was only talking in his sleep again.

"Come on, Su." (Like Lucy and now Edmund, Peter also used the nickname for her sometimes) He nudged her gently. "I know you aren't really asleep."

"I'm not, but I thought you were," Susan explained.

Every once in a while there was a sleepless night or two when neither could sleep a wink. On such nights they would just lay there and talk for hours. Usually, Susan did fall asleep after a while, but once she happened to be up all night and was still awake when he was leaving.

"Where are you going?" she had asked as he climbed out of the bed.

"It's almost morning." Peter sighed as he started to take off his night-shirt. "I have to leave now." He slipped on his boots and tunic which he always left at the foot of the bed, folded the night-shirt and placed it on his pillow.

"Goodbye," Susan said softly as he turned to leave. "See you later."

"Goodbye." He smiled at her even though she couldn't see it. Before he left, he leaned forward and kissed her on the forehead.

It was an innocent gesture but there was something so endearing and intimate about it that Susan couldn't help but feel a rush of confusing emotions rushing through her. Strange emotions she couldn't name, explain, or even understand.


	11. Love heals the illness of time

One morning, Susan woke up with a sore throat and a slight fever. The dwarf who brought her her breakfast that morning realized that she wasn't well. Her cheeks were flushed and the rest of her was pale. _Too_ pale.

"Are you alright, Lady Susan?" the dwarf asked nervously, setting the tray down on the window-seat, walking over to Susan, standing on his tipy-toes so he could reach her, and putting his hand on her forehead. He pulled it away instantly and let out a shriek of terror.

"Ow." Susan moaned, rubbing her temples. She also had a headache and the shouting made it worse.

"Call the royal physician!" The Dwarf hung his head out of the middle of the chamber doors and bellowed these words in a loud echo that rang through more than half the castle.

"Again, ow," Susan whimpered. The echo was meant to help her, but it seemed to be doing her more harm than good.

The physician was an elderly male faun with a salt-and-pepper coloured beard and extremely bright green eyes. His name was Merelan. His goat half was pudgy and wide-looking while the human half was slender. Especially his hands and fingers which rivaled those of dryads. Wanting Narnia to be saved and being very loyal to the high king -he had also been King Frank's physician- Susan's health was of deep concern to him. He examined her closely and made her say, "Ah" over and over again until she very much wanted to hit him and had to sit on her hands to fight the urge, knowing it was unkind and her longing to slap him was probably mostly fever-educed anyway.

At last Merelan nodded to himself, sighed, and turned to Edmund, Lucy, and the white bear high king, who were of course all waiting in the doorway of the room, eager to learn whether or not she was going to be alright.

"My kings and queen, I have good news and bad news," he told them. "She isn't deathly ill."

"That would be the good news?" Edmund assumed, folding his arms across his chest.

"What's the bad news?" Lucy asked, timidly taking a step further into the room.

"The bad news is that if she is not looked after well enough and if she does not get enough rest, she could become much worse until there would be no physician in this world -or in any other, I should say- that could do her any good," he said gravely.

"No worries there!" Edmund blurted out. "We'll take care of her."

"Thank you, Edmund," Susan croaked, realizing she'd pretty much lost her voice.

Edmund took a step back and whispered, "Is she contagious?"

"Ed!" The white bear growled.

"I'm kidding," Edmund assured him.

"Well then," the physician said in a deep, very serious tone. "Make sure she gets enough to drink so she doesn't grow weak and pass out. As for food, I'd recommend hot soups. They'll make her stronger and may even help her throat get better quicker." He paused for a moment because he saw that Edmund was writing all of this down and needed a chance to finish. Then he went on, "I'll leave some medicine for her as well. Make sure she takes it three times day once with each meal. As she gets better -here's hoping- start cutting back. When her fever goes away make it only twice daily. And when her throat is well enough that she can talk and swallow with out any pain, make it once a day and make the amount you give her smaller." He looked over at Edmund. "Did you get all that, your majesty?"

Edmund nodded. "Yes, Master Merelan. Thank you for your time."

"Oh twas no trouble," he said kindly.

Lucy pulled three diamonds out of her dress's apron pocket and offered it to him.

Merelan shook his head and motioned for her to keep them. "No thank you, my queen. She is the one who will show her gratitude by saving us all. No payment for me, I shall not take so much as a silver scraping."

Lucy pulled a pretty little silver bell out of her other pocket, walked over to Susan's bedside, and handed it to her. "Here. Peter gave it to me when I was five and caught the mumps. It's so you can ring it if you need anything."

"Thank you, Lu," Susan croaked, leaning over to give Lucy a hug.

To say Susan was well looked after would be an insult to the level of thoughtful kindness Lucy, Peter, Edmund, and the servants showed towards her.

At noon, Lucy entered the room, brisk and cheerful, carrying a tray of hot mushroom soup and a tall glass of orange juice. She talked to her and told her different stories to amuse her while she ate. Most of them were of her life growing up alongside Edmund, being raised by Peter. Some of them were quite funny and made Susan laugh. At first most of the laughs turned into coughs but after she was full and had taken a little medicine, she seemed to be doing better.

The improvement however did not last through the night. She became much worse and took on a fitful state of half-sleep in which she groaned and cried constantly. Her fever became worse even than it had been that morning.

Peter, who had of course been in the bed beside her, looked after her through the night since no one else could enter the locked chamber doors. He put cool cloths on her forehead and spoke soothingly to her until she was able to fall into a somewhat restful sleep.

Because of the raging fever, Susan couldn't remember much about that night afterwards. She had a vague recollection of Peter whispering, "Shh..it's alright... You're going to be fine..." and stroking her hand. She also knew that he must have been crying at one point because when he'd bent over her to flip over the cool cloth on her forehead, she felt two of his tears land on her nose.

The next morning, her fever was down a little and her throat didn't hurt anymore. However she still felt sort of dizzy and weak. She spend most of the day sleeping and took little or no notice of the many servant visitors who brought her little get-well-soon gifts.

Some of the little squirrels who lived in the apple and peach orchards gathered nuts, snuck into the castle, and piled them outside her doorway. Resulting in Edmund tripping over them when he tried to walk into the chamber to check on Susan. Who thankfully was so sound asleep and didn't hear him curse under his breath before adding, "Aw, nuts!" Then he picked up a walnut, examined it, and shrugged.

Word traveled fast through Narnia that Susan was ill and many across that great kingdom longed to see her. Many -far more than could be admitted in to meet her face to face- arrived at Cair Paravel to inquire about her health. Unfortunately, not all the visitors were good of heart nor did they all wish for her to get better nor did they all use the front door. The White Witch heard of her illness and thought it would be a great chance to frighten her away from Narnia.

So while the white bear high king, Edmund, and Lucy were busy taking messages from well-wishers in the throne room, Jadis sent a cold burst of air that flung open one of Susan's chamber windows. Then, she climbed in and stood in front of the bed. All seven feet of her towered over poor Susan as she started to wake up.

When she saw the strange icy-eyed lady standing in front of her she let out a weak yelp. "Who are you?"

"Don't you know?" The white witch laughed wickedly. "Haven't they told you all about me?"

"You're..." Susan gasped weakly. "The...white..." she began shaking so fearfully that she couldn't finish the sentence.

Jadis gave her a hard, cold, stare. "So you're the one."

Susan let out a whimper. No wonder the Narnians feared the witch. She was so tall and imposing! She was even taller than Susan's handsome father had been. He had, at six foot something, been the tallest person she'd ever seen; now seeing this witch in front of her, he didn't seem quite so great in height.

"I suppose I could thank you for getting Peter's hopes up." Jadis shrugged her shoulders. "It'll make him that much easier to control when you fail. Which will make my decent to power easier as well. So I could thank you." She paused for a moment and glared at her. "But I think I just hate you too much."

I wish she'd just turn me to stone and get it over with, Susan thought miserably. She couldn't stand one more moment of this torment and was too scared to realize the importance of the witch's words.

Suddenly, in quite a different tone, Jadis said, "But there now. Wouldn't you like to go home? You're so sick. They can't care for you here. You almost died last night you know. Would you really want Narnia to be your grave, child? Go back where you came from."

"No, I will not go," Susan blurted out. Her voice wasn't strong but her resolve was. She couldn't leave the Narnians to this witch. She couldn't. She'd rather die trying to save them then grow old with the knowledge she'd destroyed them.

"What was that?" Jadis took a step towards her.

Susan was so frightened that she let out the loudest scream she'd ever made in her life and fainted.

The white bear high king heard this and raced into the chamber. "Susan? What's wrong?" He saw the White Witch standing there and growled at her. "What do you think you're doing? Go back to your castle and leave her alone. You have no power over us. Not now."

"Not yet," the witch agreed coldly. "But soon enough." And with that she leapt out the window and journeyed back to her own castle.

The white bear rushed over to Susan's side and nudged her with his nose. "Come on, Su," he said softly. "Get up."

She didn't stir. She remained in a dead faint and no matter how much he pushed her with his nose and tapped her with his paws, she didn't move a muscle.

Edmund and Lucy rushed in carrying buckets of water and handfuls of smelling salts in hopes of reviving her.

"Please sister," Lucy said sweetly, although Susan was not really her sister she had come to view her as such. "Wake up."

"Su, get up," Edmund order-pleaded, wiping her eyes with a damp cloth, hoping the wetness would awaken her.

The white bear nudged her again. "Please get up. We need you." He rested his head against her cheek. "I need you." He paused for a moment before saying what he was really feeling at the moment. It was more than just losing his chance to be free. It was more than losing Lucy and Edmund's newest companion. It was something far greater than that. "I love you."

Lucy and Edmund gasped at the same time. They exchanged glances that were somewhere between surprised and delighted. Of course they would have been much more pleased to learn of the high king's feelings if the object of his affections wasn't unconscious.

Thankfully she did wake up a few moments later. But it was clear that she hadn't heard what he'd said to her at all. She was shocked even to discover that he and the others were in the room with her at all because the last thing she could remember seeing was the witch.

"Thanks be to the Lion," Edmund said, leaning over to hug her as soon as her eyes fluttered open. "You're alright."

"Edmund?" she murmured, blinking in confusion at him. "When did you get here?"

"Susan!" Lucy cried happily, seeing that she was awake again.

"Lucy?" Susan wondered what had happened to the witch. Had it all been just a bad dream? It had seemed so real.

The white bear's lips curled up into a relieved smile. "You're alright."

"What happened?" Susan asked, putting a hand to her forehead.

"The witch came into your room and you fainted," Edmund recapped with a shrug.

"You missed it, Peter said he-" Lucy started before Edmund glared at her. "What?" She mouthed to him.

"Let him tell her himself," Edmund hissed back.

"Tell me what?" Susan asked.

"Nothing," the white bear blurted out.

"Nothing?" Susan raised an eyebrow at him.

"That's right," Edmund said. He elbowed Lucy. "It's nothing. Right?"

Lucy didn't answer.

"Lu!" Edmund hissed.

"Well I'm not going to _lie_ ," Lucy said firmly.

"Lie about what?" Susan asked, feeling rather fed up by this point.

"Nothing!" Edmund and Peter exclaimed at the same time.

Lucy kept silent.

The scare from the witch and the faint hadn't been good for Susan's recovery. She actually got a little worse. She became weak and timid and even tried to refuse food once or twice before Edmund threatened to force-feed her and Lucy started to cry.

That night in the throne room before Peter went into Susan's bed chamber, he took the silver apple out of the window sill.

"What are you doing?" Edmund demanded severely. "Put that back. We're running out of those. Remember? Six have gone rotten. What exactly are you going to do with it?"

"I'm going to give it to Susan," Peter said in a very determined voice. "So she'll get well again. Remember Digory wanted one for his mother to make her recover from her illness?"

"We don't even know if it worked or not," Edmund reminded him. "Do you want to risk losing one of those? We've even stopped using the juice in our cloth washing to conserve them."

"I have to try," Peter said, tears starting to form in his eyes.

"Pete..." Edmund had to give in. He couldn't take this. "Fine. Go ahead."

Peter hugged him. "Thank you, Edmund!" he cried happily. "You're the best."

"Yes I am, now get off me!" Edmund squirmed out of his grip.

Susan lay sleeping fitfully, curled up into a comfortable ball of woolen blankets and velvet pillows. She felt someone gently shake her shoulder. She woke up and blinked in the darkness. She could only see the shape of boy she knew from his voice and from the fact that he was in her room at that hour, to be Peter.

"Susan, you up?" he asked.

"I am now," Susan half-snapped, not quite as annoyed as she made out.

In the darkness of the room, Susan could see the faint glimmer of a silver apple and a silver knife. She saw the contour of Peter's hand cutting the apple into pieces. Then she felt him sit down beside her on the bed and put an arm around her so that she sat up. Then he held one piece of the fruit to her lips.

"What in the world?" Susan muttered, feeling very confused.

"Eat it," Peter said gently.

She leaned forward and took a bite. It tasted wonderful and made her feel as if life and love themselves were flowing through her veins.

Slowly but steadily, he fed her the rest of the apple. When she had finished she felt a little better and a relaxed healthful sleep came over her. She was so sleepy that she didn't realize that she'd fallen asleep with her head rested against the high king's shoulder and that he still had his arm around her. He held her for a few moments before letting go, tucking her back into the bed, and planting a kiss on her cheek.

"Goodnight, Susan," he whispered, crawling back over to his own side of the bed.


	12. More about love

The next morning, everyone was delighted to see that the apple had indeed made Susan healthy again. The servants cheered and danced about when they learned the news. None thought any worse of the high king for sacrificing one of their precious silver apples; if anything they thought it was a very kingly -not to mention loving- act.

"I've no doubts they'll be married soon," one young dryad (Maplebella's little sister) whispered to the daughter of one of the stable fauns as she kneaded the dough for the noon meal's bread.

"Who are you talking about?" the faun's daughter asked.

"The High King Peter and the Lady Susan of course." Maplebella's little sister laughed. "Who else does anyone speak of around here anymore?"

"Good point." The faun's daughter smiled good-naturedly, pulled out a block of cheese, and started cutting it into pieces small enough to go with the bread when it was finished. "But you really think he'll ask her to marry him?"

"Oh yes, of course!" Maplebella's little sister exclaimed. "I heard mother and father talking last night and mother said, 'We'll be cleaning and cooking for a wedding sometime soon, you know.' And father said, 'Whose wedding?' and mother snorted and said, 'Whose do you think! Grandmother isn't getting married again at her age.' Then father said to leave his mother out of it and to please explain whatever it was she meant. So mother said, 'Haven't you seen the way the high king looks at the lass these days?'"

(The 'Lass' of course meant 'Susan'.)

"Which way does he look at her?" the faun's daughter asked.

Being only eight, Maplebella's sister didn't know much about couples and romance. She shrugged. "How would I know? But mother must be right. She always is. Even father says so."

"Your father says so because your mother will smack him if he says otherwise," The faun's daughter, who was two years older than Maplebella's sister and more grown up in wittiness, said jokingly.

Mapplebella's little sister smiled and flicked a bit of flour at her face.

"Hey!" she laughed, reaching for a towel to wipe the powdery white smudge off her nose with. "None of that! I was just joking around."

Upstairs in her chamber, Susan climbed out of bed for the first time in two days, dressed, and walked down to breakfast before anyone could bring it up to her.

In the dinning hall, Edmund and Lucy were struggling to gift-wrap a long object of some sort. The white bear was trying to instruct them on the proper way of doing this but they seemed to be ignoring his advice, much more keen on arguing with each other than actually getting the job done.

"Lucy, look what you did!" Edmund snapped, lifting his string-enwrapped finger up, causing whatever the object was to slide up like a yo-yo toy. "You've tied me to the present!"

"Oops," Lucy said, pulling out a pair of scissors (not the magical clothes-making ones), and tried to cut him lose. "Don't worry, I'll fix it."

"Hey, quit poking me with those!" Edmund barked, yanking his hand out of her reach. "That hurts."

"Well if you'd just hold still..." Lucy protested, bringing the scissors towards his finger again.

"That's it!" the white bear exclaimed. "Next time we have a present for Susan, we are just giving it to her as is and not bothering with all this wrapping nonsense."

"It's not nonsense," Lucy insisted, looking a little insulted. "It's pretty!"

"How is this not nonsense?" Edmund demanded, holding up a rather frilly piece of red ribbon.

"It's pretty," Lucy repeated firmly.

Susan entered the room and looked over at the seat beside Lucy where she usually sat when she had meals with them, surprised to see Edmund there instead of on the other side of the table where he ought to have been. "Good morning."

"Good morning, Su." Lucy stood and pulled Edmund up with her. He let out a grunt but he didn't protest to being dragged over to where Susan was standing. "The three of us have something for you." She lifted up Edmund's hand to which the present was still tied.

"You're giving me Edmund?" Susan raised an eyebrow in confusion.

"No, of course not." Lucy laughed, motioning at the half-wrapped stick-like thing hanging off of Edmund's hand.

"Your gift sort of got attached to me," Edmund muttered, trying to shake his finger loose.

"You shouldn't," Susan told them. "You've already given me so many things."

"But we want to," Lucy assured her, grabbing onto Edmund's wrist and finally managing to pull his fingers free.

"You didn't need to tear the skin off!" Edmund snapped, blowing on his string-burned fingers.

Lucy ignored him and handed the present to Susan. "It's from all of us but it was Peter's idea."

Susan looked over at the white bear. "It was?"

He nodded at her. "Yes."

Susan slowly pulled back the brown paper and saw it was a bow, the kind you shoot arrows with. It was sleek and smooth looking with pretty ivory tips. "Thanks," she said, running her fingers over the bow string.

"You're welcome," Lucy said politely.

"It was our mother's," Edmund told her sadly.

Susan felt like she'd been hit across the face with a large brick. She couldn't take something that belonged to their mother! They were crazy to even offer it to her. This should be treasured and well looked after by them, not just given to their newest comrade as a glad-you're-feeling-better gift.

She held it back out to them. "I can't take this."

"But you have to," Lucy told her, bending under the table and pulling out a long white quiver full of arrows. "We had this made just for you to use with it." She handed the quiver to Susan.

Susan smiled when she saw 'SP' embroidered on the back of it, knowing it must stand for, 'Susan Pevensie'. She could see from the excited expressions on their faces that they wanted her to keep it but she still felt she ought not to. "But if the bow was your mother's..."

"It'll be something even more special to give to you," the white bear said, looking up at her with a tender expression.

"But I don't know how to use it," Susan told them.

"We can teach you!" Lucy clapped her hands excitedly. "Ed and I are both great archers! Aren't we Ed?"

"Well, Lucy is anyway," the white bear joked, winking at Susan.

"Lose one lousy round to your baby sister and never hear the end of it!" Edmund sulked.

That night, Susan wasn't asleep or even in bed when Peter came in. Edmund no longer had to put out the fire and blow out the lit candles before his arrival because Susan had gotten into the habit of doing it herself. At first he routinely checked to make sure she hadn't forgotten but over time his trust in her grew and he stopped coming in at night at all. Only Peter came into the bed chamber at night now; always around the same late hour. Susan now sat up in a chair by the fire place which of course she'd already put out.

The doors opened and Peter waked in. "You're still up." He said it more like a statement then a question.

Susan decided to answer it anyway. "Yes, I couldn't sleep."

"Why?" Peter asked anxiously. "You aren't feeling ill again are you?"

"Oh no, I'm fine," Susan assured him.

"Good," he said, relieved.

"I just...I don't know..." Susan sighed, standing up and walking over to him. "I was thinking about some...things...I just have a lot on my mind I guess."

"Me too," Peter whispered, taking a step closer to her. "Susan, there's something I have to tell you..."

Susan felt him slip his arms around her waist. "What are you doing?" She whispered.

"This," Peter said softly, pulling himself even closer to her now.

Before she knew what was happening, she felt his lips press against hers and realized that he was kissing her. For a moment she stood dumbstruck not sure what to think or do, or even how to feel about what was happening between them. Then it came to her that she was feeling the same feelings she'd felt before when he'd kissed her on the forehead, only stronger. Much stronger. Was it possible to be in love with someone when you'd never even seen their face? Susan found that the answer to that question was yes. Without shadow of doubt, yes. He wasn't a stranger to her anymore. She knew him. She worried about him and cared about him. She liked him. More than that, she loved him. She started to kiss him back.

When they finally pulled away from each other, he whispered, "I love you."

"I love you too." She reached out and touched his cheek with the palm of her hand.

Peter put his hand over the hand she'd placed on his cheek held it for a moment, then brought it to his lips and kissed it. "I'm so happy you feel the same way, I was so worried that you didn't. I didn't think I could make you care for me."

"Why would you think that?" Susan asked him.

"You wanted to go back so badly," Peter reminded her. "And when you stayed, I knew it wasn't because you wanted to be with me. I knew you were doing it for the Narnians."

"Isn't that what you wanted?" Susan pointed out. "Isn't that why you brought me here? To save Narnia?"

"It was," Peter agreed. "But after a while, I don't know... It just became more than that."

"More than that?" Susan echoed.

"If you left after it was all over... I don't know what I'd do," Peter told her. "What good would being free be if I didn't have you by my side? I'd rather be a bear half the time and see you every day than be a human every day and not have you around."

Even though she couldn't only just barely see him do it in the darkness of the room, Peter got down one knee and took her hands in his again. "Susan, I need someone like you by my side. When Narnia is restored to me the kingdom will need a queen."

"Are you asking me to marry you?" Susan asked softly.

"That depends on if you're saying yes," Peter teased.

"Well I'd only be saying yes you if you were actually asking me," Susan teased back. "If not I guess it _depends_ on if you're asking me."

Peter laughed and let out a sigh. "Yes, I'm asking," he gave in.

"I'm saying yes," Susan told him.

"Yes?" Peter cried happily, standing up and embracing her tightly.

"Yes," Susan whispered, resting her head on his shoulder.

They let go of each other and climbed into bed. Each on their own side. Both slept with smiles on their faces although they couldn't be seen.

When he entered the throne room early that morning before turning back into a white bear, Peter found that both Lucy and Edmund were waiting up for him.

"Well?" they both blurted out at the same time.

"Lucy, what are you doing up?" Peter asked her, more because he was concerned about his little sister than because he was avoiding the question.

"I couldn't sleep, I was too excited." Lucy squealed.

"Excited about what?" Peter asked her.

"About you and Susan, of course," Lucy told him.

"And how did you know about that?" Peter glared at Edmund, knowing it went back to him somehow. It always did.

Edmund held up a piece of paper. "I found your pro and con 'Should I ask her to marry me?' list."

Peter turned red. "Give me that!" He ripped the list out of Edmund's hands. "That's personal property."

"I noticed you didn't put anything in the cons other than, 'she might say no'," Edmund teased, grinning up at his brother.

Lucy bent down and looked at the paper Peter was holding behind his back. "Why is 'She snores' in the 'pros'?"

"He's so smitten with her that he thinks it's cute," Edmund laughed. "It's quite sickening, really."

"So what did she say?" Lucy persisted, looking at her elder brother eagerly.

"Well, since you all so rudely went through my personal belongings, I don't think I'll tell you." Peter smirked at them with a twinkle of a amusement in his eyes.

"Come on, Peter, please," Lucy begged, with her hands pressed together like she was about to say a prayer. "Pretty please?" She pouted and did her best 'cute little girl' expression.

Peter gave in. "Oh, alright. If you must know, she said yes."

Lucy let out an excited squeal and hugged him. "Isn't it wonderful?"

"She actually said yes?" Edmund seemed surprised.

"What, did you expect her to say no?" Peter asked him.

"I figured she'd say maybe and then go write her own pro-and-con list." Edmund shrugged. "I mean considering she's never even seen your face..."

"What does that matter?" Peter demanded.

"It doesn't," Edmund said pensively. "Not really. But I don't know, Peter... I like her, honest I do... So please don't take this the wrong way, it's just... I don't think she's going to be able to finish breaking the spell."

"Why not?" Peter looked a little upset now. "She's been wonderful. You know perfectly well she puts out all the candles herself now. She doesn't care that she can't see me."

"That's just it, Pete," Edmund said with a 'please don't be cross with me for saying this' expression on his face. "I think that, deep down, she really does."


	13. Don't Make Promises You Can't Keep

Little did Peter know that Edmund was right. Susan wasn't a shallow person; she cared about more than physical appearance. But deep down inside the core of her heart, she longed to see what her future husband's face was like. She her had a dangerous sense of curiosity locked up inside her and sadly the key to unlocking it was to be handed over to her all too soon.

It started one day when Peter, in his white bear form, was wandering about in the orchard a little distance away from Susan and Lucy who had gone to place flowers on the feet of the stone Maplebella the same way people in our world might place flowers on a tombstone.

Suddenly the white bear stopped mid-step and sniffed the air. Some large beast was approaching him.

His keen polar bear eyes saw the great Lion, Aslan himself, coming from the distant hills.

The Lion leapt over the stone ivy-covered walls of the orchard and walked over to the white bear.

"Peter," he said in a deep voice by way of greeting.

"Welcome, Aslan." The white bear lowered his nose to the ground as a sort of bow.

"Peace, high king of Narnia," Aslan said in a pleased but somewhat grave tone of voice. "I bring you some news as well as a warning."

"What sort of a warning, Aslan?" the white bear asked, his eyes widening with great surprise.

"First the news," Aslan said calmly, his dark golden eyes urging the high king to remain calm. "There is another son of Adam and another daughter of Eve in Narnia. They are from the same world as Susan. She knows them."

"If they're her friends, they are more than welcome to come here," the white bear said generously. "It wouldn't be seemly to leave them to the White Witch's mercies."

"No, Peter!" Aslan said firmly, his voice almost a roar. "They are not friends and you are not to allow them to stay at Cair Paravel. They are currently staying with Mr. Tumnus and have been rather foul tempered towards him, claiming he kidnapped them when he was only pulling them away from the White Witch's spies. They demand to see Susan because, alas, poor Tumnus mentioned her to them. You are to bring her to Tumnus's house to see them and leave her there for a day. After which you are to bring her, and _only_ her, back to Cair Paravel, and things are to go on just as they did before."

"But if they are not friends, why should she go to see them?" the white bear wanted to know.

"They won't stay still nor will they trust Tumnus without proof that he knows Susan. I think the foolish little humans actually believe he killed her and is planning on killing them next. This must be done to keep them from lashing out in stupidity and blind fear, possibly harming Tumnus," Aslan explained.

"I see." The white bear sighed. He didn't much like the idea but Aslan's orders were Aslan's orders. Also if Tumnus's well being was at stake then really what choice did he have? The faun had always been so loyal to him and his brother and such a good friend to his sister.

"But Peter," Aslan said solemnly, "now the warning."

The white bear looked Aslan right in the eye and listened very carefully.

"You must make Susan promise you that she will not bring anything back with her. That if she is offered a present from either human, she will refuse it. If she does not, great trouble will be brought upon you," Aslan warned him. With that, Aslan left just as quickly as he'd arrived echoing, "Don't forget, son of Adam, make her promise."

"I will," the white bear whispered more to himself than to Aslan.

Feeling rather down-hearted over the conversation he'd just had with Aslan, the white bear walked slowly over to where Susan and Lucy were now weaving daisy chains.

Lucy had just made a wreath out of the daisies as well as a few leaves that had dropped from the trees and was wearing it on her head like a crown. She looked so endearing that even his worry over having to take Susan away from Cair Paravel for a day, couldn't stop Peter from smiling a little when he saw her.

"Isn't it becoming?" Lucy laughed cheerfully. "I know it doesn't look as nice as my crown but it's a good second, don't you think?"

The white bear let out a chuckle and nodded before turning to Susan. "We need to talk."

Hearing the seriousness of his tone, Susan stopped grinning, placed down her daisy chain, and followed him into a deeper part of the orchard. She listened while the white bear told her about Aslan's orders.

"Who are these people?" Susan asked, feeling rather confused. "Aslan says I know them?"

"That's what he said," the white bear told her. "I'm just as surprised as you."

"But they're not my friends?" Susan shook her head. None of this made any sense.

"No," the white bear said sadly. "And yet, I must take you to see them tomorrow."

"Very well then." Susan sighed, edging a little closer to the white bear and stroking his fur in a comforting way. "I suppose I'm safe with Tumnus even if anything should go wrong, right?"

The white bear let out a weak laugh, clearly still a little sad. "Oh yes, you'll be more than safe with him. He's one of my most loyal subjects."

"Then I have nothing to fear," Susan said, wondering what there was to be sad about after all.

"No, you haven't." The white bear sighed again.

That night, Susan was so busying packing up the few things she'd need for her trip to Tumnus's house the next day that she nearly forgot to blow out the candles and put out the fire before Peter arrived. It wasn't until she heard his footsteps coming towards the chamber doors that she rushed over to the fire, dumped the water from the wash basin over it to put it out, and rushed over to the only burning candle to blow it out.

Just as spark from the candle vanished and a little wisp of smoke circled around in the darkness, the doors opened and Peter walked in.

He went over to where Susan was standing, put his arms around her, and kissed her on the neck. "I'm going to miss you so much," he murmured.

"It's only for a day." Susan laughed, gently unwrapping herself from his arms so she could finish closing the bag that contained her clothes, the horn (Peter had insisted she take it with her just in case), a change of shoes, a hair brush, and a few other small items.

"Don't remind me." Peter groaned.

"I think you can do with out me for twenty-four hours," Susan told him. "No need to be dramatic."

"You're no fun." Peter laughed, holding onto one of her hands while he spoke. "Too sensible."

"Get used to it." Susan kissed him on the cheek before letting go of his hand and crawling into her side of the bed. "I'd best get some sleep if we're leaving early tomorrow."

"I guess so," Peter said glumly, walking around the bed and climbing into his own side.

"Goodnight, Peter." Susan yawned.

Suddenly Peter remembered that he hadn't made her promise not to bring anything back with her.

"Su..."

"Yes?" she mumbled sleepily.

"I need you to promise me something."

"I'm listening," Susan said, wondering what this could possibly be about.

"Promise me that you won't bring anything back with you. If the humans should offer you anything, don't take it." Peter's voice was pleading and full of desperation.

Seeing no reason why she would even want to bring anything back with her, Susan made the promise. After all, what could they -whomever they were- offer her that would be worth anything in comparison to the smallest object in Cair Paravel? She already had everything she could possibly ever want. She was living with kind people in a beautiful castle, engaged to be married to the man she loved... What else was there?

In the morning, the white bear carried Susan on his back to Tumnus's house. Although he traveled at a great speed and made good time, she got the feeling that he was lingering here and there. She was quite right in thinking this. Peter was being a little slow because he had a terrible feeling in the pit of his stomach that something bad was in store. He tried to tell himself that everything would be alright, that there was nothing to fear, but it didn't work. He felt awful. As though he was leading both himself and his bride to be into a terrible fate about to get horribly out of hand. He just didn't know why he felt that way.

When it was nearly noon, Susan sat up straight on the white bear's back (she had been laid across it, dozing, using the white fur on his head like a pillow) and said, "Are we there?" She looked over to a neat-looking little cave only a few feet away from them.

"Yes," he told her, his voice still very glum. "We've come at last. You can climb off my back now."

Susan slid off and looked at him. Even his bright blue eyes seemed dulled with sadness. "Peter, what's wrong? Aren't you coming to say hello to Tumnus?"

The white bear shook his head. "No. This is where I will leave you. I'll be back here tomorrow to take you home again."

"Home," Susan echoed. It seemed so strange to think that Cair Paravel was home now. That she belonged there, was part of their family, lived there; it seemed almost as if it had always been that way. Had it only really been a matter of months?

"Goodbye, Susan." He grunted softly.

"Goodbye, Peter." Susan put her arms around the white bear's neck and hugged him.

Then she went on her own up to the front door of Tumnus's cave and knocked. The door swung open and Tumnus was standing there with a cheerful grin that seemed a little put on. Clearly whomever was staying with him hadn't been very agreeable guests and were wearing him down a bit.

"Ah, Hello Susan." He greeted her respectfully, opening the door a little wider so she could come in. "Come and see the other daughter of Eve and her cousin. They've been waiting for you."

Peering about in the dim rosy-fire-lit living room, Susan saw two shockingly familiar faces that she had not thought about for a long time. A girl with strawberry blond hair and a boy with freckles. "Katie? Simon?" Were they doing here?

"It's Katherine!" Katie barked.

"Susan! You're alright!" Simon jumped up from his place and ran over to hug her.

"Why are you hugging me?" Susan asked, trying to free herself from his grip.

"I thought you'd been killed or something," Simon explained, beaming up at her.

"Why would you think that?" Susan asked, feeling more than a little awkward.

Simon shrugged. "I dunno."

"He's a conspiracy freak." Katie rolled her eyes.

"Am not!" Simon sulked, folding his arms across his chest.

"Are too," Katie insisted, slowly rising from the chair she'd been sitting in and walking over to Susan. She noticed the pretty clothing she was wearing and asked where she'd gotten it from.

"Cair Paravel," Susan told her truthfully, without relieving the secret of the magic scissors.

"Chair What-ravel?" Simon wrinkled his forehead in confusion.

"Cair Paravel," Susan corrected him. "It's the castle where I live now."

Katie's eyes flashed with envy. "You live in a castle? _You_? why?"

"I think you should tell me how you got here first," Susan said, talking a seat by the fire.

"How come we have to go first?" Simon demanded.

"'Because if you don't, I wont tell you anything more about where I've been." Susan shrugged her shoulders at them. "Your choice."

"Fine." Katie gave in. "If you must know, Mrs. Macready found us -Simon's a lousy hider-"

"Hey, I wasn't the one hiding behind a curtain!" Simon sneered, glaring at her. "That's the most obvious place you could have possibly picked."

Susan didn't feel a bit sorry for Katie hiding there and getting caught. It served her right. She'd been so eager to hide that she'd taken the curtain for herself. If she hadn't, Susan knew she would have probably never gone into the spare room and found Narnia. She would have never met Peter either and that would have been a shame.

"Well you hid under a bed!" Katie shot back. "That's even worse."

"Is not!" Simon insisted.

"Is too."

"No it is not."

"Yes it is!"

They bickered on for a few minutes before finally returning to the point. They explained how after they had been found, Mrs. Macready had asked them where Susan was and they had to confess that they didn't know. Simon remembered seeing her trying to open the doors to couple of spare rooms and he and Katie went to look for her there. Seeing the wardrobe which had been left open a crack, they'd assumed she was hiding in there and climbed in after her to pull her out. When they didn't find her, they foolishly shut the wardrobe door behind them thinking the click and sudden darkness might scare her out of hiding. Then they had found themselves out in the open air in the middle of a wood.

"Then we met that strange goat-man and he took us here," Simon explained.

"So you've been living with Mr. Tumnus the past few months?" Susan asked them, trying to figure out exactly what had happened.

"Months?" Katie laughed. "What are you talking about? We've been here only a day or so."

Then Susan remembered what Peter had said to her about time differences in other worlds, perhaps while months had been passing for her in Cair Paravel, back in the place the Narnians now called, 'Spare Oom' only a few minutes had gone by and sometime during the end of those minutes, Katie and Simon had found their way into Narnia and had only come a day or two ago rather than the few months ago in Narnia-time Susan had arrived.

"You look older..." Simon noticed, squinting very hard at Susan.

"That's just the way her clothes are made." Katie snipped jealously. "Any good designer can make a child look more grown up."

"Now tell us about where you've been," Simon said looking eagerly at Susan and ignoring Katie's remark.

"You wouldn't believe me," Susan warned them. "And I shouldn't like to be called a liar."

"But we will believe you," Simon promised. "Just tell us."

"Oh, don't you see, Simon?" Katie tossed her head proudly. "She's not telling us anything because there's nothing to tell. I'll bet she doesn't live in a castle at all. She probably just stole those clothes from someone."

Susan glared at her. Being considered a liar was bad enough, but a thief? And by Katie of all people! No she would set the record straight right away. "I did not steal this dress and I do live in a castle."

"Then tell us about it, your high highness," Katie mocked cruelly. "Tell us about how the proud princess came to be so decked out."

"If you'd stop jawing for a moment, I would," Susan retorted angrily.

She told them about how she had come to live in a beautiful castle by the eastern sea and how there was a little boy and a little girl who were king and queen and were like siblings to them. She mentioned that their brother was under a spell that turned him into a white bear during the day and only allowed him to be a human at night. She also told them that she'd grown to love the elder brother and that she was going to marry him.

"You're going to marry a king?" Katie asked in disbelief.

"Not just any king." Tumnus popped his head in from the kitchen and added, "The high king."

"I guess that makes you royalty!" Simon gasped, excitedly. "I know a queen!"

"She's not a queen yet." Katie frowned at him. "And, besides, there has to be something wrong with him if he's going to marry you."

Susan assured her that there was nothing wrong with Peter and that he was perfectly respectable. Although not intending to, she slipped up and told them that she shared a room with him at night.

Katie let out a gasp, getting the wrong idea.

"No, it's not like that!" Susan turned beet red when she realized what she'd seemly implied. "He's on his own side of the bed."

"So he doesn't try to do anything...?" Simon asked her.

Susan was utterly appalled at the very suggestion. "Of course not!"

Later that evening, Tumnus was fast asleep in his chair by the fire while Katie, Simon, and Susan continued to talk amongst themselves. They managed to get the whole story out of Susan by implying that if she was hiding something, it was something dirty. And to assure them it was nothing of the sort, she gave in and told them about Peter's nightly visits.

Realizing that Susan had never actually seen the man she was engaged to marry, Katie laughed and said, "But can't you look at him when he's sleeping? I know I wouldn't be able to sleep beside someone every night and not even know what they looked like. Much less agree to marry that person."

"He doesn't come until all the lights are put out," Susan explained. "His brother Edmund used to do it but I do it on my own now to save him the trouble."

"I wonder why he doesn't want you to see him." Simon hummed contemplatively.

"Maybe it's because he's so ugly," Katie guessed meanly.

"Maybe he's not human after allm" Simon came up with. "Maybe he's a..." He leaned over and pointed at Mr. Tumnus. "One of those!"

"I highly doubt he's a faun." Susan rolled her eyes. That was almost as stupid as Katie's 'ugly' remark.

"Me too," Katie agreed. "He'd have to be something far worse than that to keep his face a secret."

"Maybe he has a green face," Simon came up with.

"Or he could be a troll!" Katie exclaimed.

"He doesn't feel like one," Susan blurted out, feeling that she really must defend him.

"How do you know what he feels like?" Katie asked. Although she'd mentioned everything else, Susan had managed to keep the fact that he put his arms around her and kissed her a secret. So much for that now.

"Well we kissed..." Susan admitted, blushing much harder than she thought humanly possible.

"But that might just be part of the enchantment," Simon told her. "He probably does that on purpose."

"Does what exactly?" Susan demanded.

"Makes himself seem human," Katie explained for Simon.

"He does nothing of the sort!" Susan insisted.

"How do you know that for sure?" Katie raised an eyebrow at her.

"I just know," Susan said weakly.

"Well whatever it is," Katie said, standing up and walking over to Tumnus's book shelves, "I know what will put an end to the mystery." She pulled out a small tinderbox from the bottom shelf. "One quick look when he's sleeping," she advised her. "No one will ever know and you can have peace of mind."

"I shouldn't." Susan knew it was wrong, but the temptation was growing all the same.

"Oh come on, who's it going to hurt?" Katie held out the box to her.

The next day, Susan met the white bear just like they had planned.

His black lips curled up in a smile when she saw her approaching. She seemed perfectly fine. Perhaps he had worried for nothing. She hugged him and climbed on his back.

"Home to Cair Paravel!" The white bear exclaimed cheerfully, not knowing that Susan had broken her promise and that in her bag right next to the horn, there was a small tinderbox just waiting to be used.

Susan had gone back on her word in two ways. She took the tinderbox but she also took back with her something else even more dangerous: their advice.


	14. The Betrayal

The room was, as usual, pitch black. Susan laid on the bed, pretending to be asleep. She didn't want to talk to Peter tonight. She felt little pangs of guilt every time she heard his voice now. Guilt, not for something she had done, but for something she was doing. She was waiting until he was sound asleep, then she planed to climb carefully out of the bed and creep over to where she'd hidden the tinderbox and a spare candle earlier that evening. She did all of this when she was certain he was no longer awake.

Holding the tinderbox in one hand in and the little candle in the other, she started walking back towards the bed. Then she stopped mid-step. She couldn't do this. He'd told her something terrible would happen if she saw him. There was still a mark on his hand from the burn he'd gotten putting out the lit candle on that walk they'd taken together. Surely there had been a real reason he'd suffered for that. He had to have been avoiding something worse. But not knowing the answer to this mystery was killing her. She didn't believe he was a troll or a faun or even ugly. Those were all stupid suggestions that didn't bother her in the least. But it did bother her that she was engaged to someone whom she'd never even laid eyes on. See was knowing, wasn't it? Then why did she feel so terrible about this?

Just one quick look, Susan thought, no one will never know; not even Peter.

She took a deep breath and used the tinderbox to light the candle. The small yellow flame shone against the back-drop of the dark room like a slowly falling comet in the night sky.

Now all Susan had to do was walk closer to the bed and hold the candle over Peter. Then she'd see him, blow it out, and go back to sleep.

One step. Two steps. Three steps. She could hear her heart pounding like a drum. Boom. Boom. Boom. Why did her feet feel so heavy? Would she be able to lift them all the way over to where Peter laid? She felt weak, cross, and sleepy. She should just turn back now. This was stupid. So what if she hadn't seen him? Did it really matter? Yes, it did. She had to do this. She was in too deep to get out now. This had to be done. It seemed almost fated. But what was fate doing here? What would she see when she held up the candle to his face? The realization that if she ever saw Peter in his human form in the daylight walking towards her she might not even recognize him vexed her and gave her the strength to take the final steps towards him.

Looking down into the puddle of the candle's light, Susan saw him. He was most certainly human. He looked like his siblings, she realized. Not an exact match, of course, but he did share some familiar traits with them. The major one being that he had the same nose that both Edmund and Lucy had.

Speaking of Edmund, he had been right when he'd said the night-shirt which was too big for him would fit Peter. It fit him perfectly. Susan remembered the night he'd thanked her for it as if it was a gift she had set out purposefully for him. Remembering and thinking about Peter's voice made Susan feel horrible about what she was doing now. The memory of the look the white bear had given her when she'd run away that first day broke her heart. And she knew that she was betraying him far worse now.

She couldn't explain it, but the feeling of terror kept growing and growing in her until she thought it would choke her to death from the inside out. Something terrible was about to happen.

But how could anything bad happen if he didn't even know? No one knew. They were alone in the room. All she had to do was blow out the candle and it would all be over, wouldn't it?

Suddenly a sharp _crack_ , like the sound of thawing ice echoed through the room. It took a moment but Susan figured out that the sound wasn't ice at all. It was the glass on the windows and the glass on the mirror. She looked over at the mirror and then back at one of the bay windows. Both had large fractures as if they'd been slashed with a strong knife. As if on a cue of some sort, all of the glass shattered and fell to the ground at the same time. The wind, which had become strangely powerful and cold, whipped one of the fragments in Susan's direction. It hit her left cheek giving her a slight sharp cut.

She was so startled and bewildered that she let out a cry and shuddered; her hand shook making the candle holder shake with it. Three drops of hot tallow escaped and landed on the high king's night-shirt.

Susan's wail, the sudden cold from the wind, and the sudden heat from the tallow all hit Peter at once and caused him to wake up. When he saw Susan standing above him, holding the candle, he knew what was happening, even though she didn't.

Their eyes met and Susan wanted to weep. The rest of his face was only familiar in what she could compare to his siblings but she knew those eyes. They were the white bear's eyes. And they were filled with more despair than ever before.

He looked up at her in disbelief. This wasn't happening. No, this was a nightmare. It had to be. Susan wouldn't do this! He was going to wake up any second now and find... The wind hit his cheeks; it was a winter wind... No this wasn't a nightmare after all. Susan had really betrayed him.

Knowing there was no time to waste, Peter leapt out of the bed and swung open the wardrobe. First he pulled something long and hard out of it and thrust it into Susan's hands. (She had already put down the candle.)

Susan wanted to ask him what the object was but couldn't get the words out. She opened and closed her mouth only to find that she could make no sound. Feeling very frightened, Susan clutched the object Peter had handed her so tightly her fingers ached.

Quick as a whip, Peter rushed over to the chamber doors and opened them.

The doors just opened at night with Peter here! Susan realized in a terrified state of panic. They never did before. They were always bolted.

"Edmund!" he shouted down the corridor. "It's happened!" Then he turned back to Susan with tears in his eyes. "How could you?"

Susan finally found her voice. "Peter, I...I didn't know..."

"Yes you did," Peter said, his tone bordering on angry now. "I warned you. I told you something terrible would happen. I needed you to trust me."

"I did trust you," Susan blurted out. "I...I...I just-"

Peter glared at her. "I believed in you, Susan. I thought you were going to save us all. I thought you understood me. I loved you." He shook his head in disgust and bitterly added, "But don't worry, I wont make that mistake again."

"Peter, I-" Susan was desperate to tell him that she hadn't meant to betray him. That she'd only been curious, maybe even a little frightened. She'd only done what she had thought she had to do. She wanted to beg him to explain what was going on and how to stop it.

Before she could get the words out, Edmund raced in dragging a sobbing Lucy behind him. He panted for breath, slowing down just a little as he reached the doorway.

"I knew you couldn't do it," Edmund said sadly to Susan, grabbing onto her elbow and pulling her and Lucy towards the wardrobe.

"Su," Lucy wailed as though her heart was breaking. "Couldn't you have held out just a little longer? You were so close. There were only two months left!"

"What's happening?" Susan cried out, unable to take one more second of this torment.

No one answered her. Edmund pushed aside some coats that had been blocking the very back of the wardrobe, reveling a small wooden door with a tiny key hole.

Shaking with sobs, Lucy took the key out of her pocket and unlocked the door.

The sound of sleigh bells started echoing through the castle. Lucy let out a gasp and then another sob.

Edmund gulped.

Peter shouted, "Be quick! I want you three safe no matter what happens to me."

"Peter," Lucy wept piteously. "Can't you run away?"

"No, sweetheart." Peter tried to comfort her but knew he could not. "It's part of the curse. There's nothing I can do about it." He looked over to Edmund. "Take good care of her, you're all she has in the world now."

Edmund began to cry now. "Goodbye, Pete."

"Goodbye, now go hide before she gets here." Peter nudged him and Lucy closer to the unlocked door, which they opened and traveled down sixteen steps to the bottom.

Susan was right behind them and was the last to see Peter. He gave her one last broken stare in the moon-lit room before walking out of the chamber, slamming the doors behind him.

She wanted to chase after him and probably would have if Edmund hadn't grabbed her elbow again and pretty much pulled her down the stairs.

They were all in a dark cellar-like room. Squatting very low into the left corner of the strange room, one could see a strange window-shaped rafter with wooden slits that you could peer outside through.

Edmund and Lucy were on their knees looking out of it, watching something as though spellbound.

Susan walked over to them, got on her own knees and looked out. What she saw made the blood in her veins run cold.

The ground was covered with frost and there was a giant silver sledge pulled by white reindeers the size of Shetland ponies with little silver bells tied to their feet. Seated on the sledge dressed in white velvet from head to toe, was none other than Jadis, the white witch herself. She wore a triumphant smile on her face as though she'd just won a great battle.

Approaching her was Peter. Shivering and frightened looking, he wobbled over to her. His teeth were chattering slightly from cold or else from fear.

"What's happening?" Susan whispered to Edmund.

"Don't you understand?" Edmund whispered back. "By looking at Peter before the spell was broken, you've handed him over to the White Witch."

"What?" Susan whisper-cried, thrusting her face into her hands and letting out a sob.

Through her fingers and the slits, Susan saw the White Witch say something to Peter. He nodded and climbed onto the sledge beside her.

"What is he doing?" Susan whisper-demanded bitterly, removing her hands from her face.

"He doesn't have any choice," Edmund reminded her.

"This can't be my fault," Susan whispered in shock. "It just can't be. I wouldn't do this to him. I wouldn't hurt him." She decided to try to call for him, "Pe-"

Edmund quickly put his hand over her mouth before she could finish. "Keep your voice down. The last thing we need is for her to find us here. She'll turn you, me, and Lucy into stone for sure if she sees us hidden here."

"But what about Peter?" Susan whispered back. "What will she do to him?"

Edmund shuddered. "Worse. She'll marry him."

"What?" Susan said a bit too loudly, resulting in getting Edmund's fingers smashed up against her mouth again.

"Shhhh!" He hissed.

"Why would she want to marry him?" Susan whisper-asked.

"Because," Edmund explained, "the Narnians won't go against him; he's their rightful king. She'll use him as a puppet."

"What have I done?" Susan whimpered.

With a flick of a whip at the reindeers, the sledge took off. The White witch looked straight ahead. But Peter looked back at the castle looking down into the cellar slits, he saw them looking out at him. He have them one last pathetic hopeless glance before the sledge and the sound of jingling bells vanished into the distance.

After he was gone, Susan glanced down at the object she still held in her hands. For the first time she saw what it was. Peter had given her his sword.


	15. The one who should have had him

Shortly after the White Witch had left, a heavy sleep fell on Edmund, Lucy, and Susan at once.

Afterwards, when they talked it over, none could agree one what caused them to sleep so soundly after what had happened. The ever practical Susan always said it must have been because their bodies and minds went into a state of shock after seeing Peter being taken away like that. Edmund disagreed saying that it was simply because they were so tired beinken up in the middle of the night. Lucy thought it must have been part of the enchantment somehow. People in stories where horrible things like this happened, were always falling into enchanted sleeps. The real reason was never discovered. If any of their guesses were right, they never knew for sure.

Whatever the reason, it wasn't until the sun rose in the sky bringing the horrid day after Susan's unwitting betrayal into light, that they finally woke up, all clinging to one another.

For once, Lucy was silent and let Edmund do all the talking. Thus, he was the one who explained fully what had occurred. He told her the whole truth about Peter's curse. He was a white bear by day, human by night. If a daughter of Eve had lived in Cair Paravel for a full year, sharing a bed with him every night, and never looking upon his human face, then the curse would have been lifted. Narnia would have been freed from the White Witch for ever and Peter would never have had to be a bear again. Nor would he, after the year was over, have to hide his face from her any longer. But now that Susan had taken the candle and held it over his face, catching a glimpse of him in his human form, things would be far worse than ever. Winter would return. All true Narnians would have to go into hiding or else serve the witch. Any who couldn't hide and would not serve her would surely be turned to stone or else be beaten and thrown into a dungeon. And as Edmund had told her before, Peter's fate would be the worst of all. He would indeed be free from being a white bear but he would be the witch's husband.

When Susan heard all of this, her heart sank and she broke down sobbing again. "Oh, what I have I done?"

"I blame myself," Edmund said softly. "I knew you wouldn't make it. I could have advised Peter to run away when he had the chance. He'd still have been a bear but this would have never happened."

"You would have wanted him to leave Susan?" Lucy gasped, looking rather shocked.

"Well if he had, he wouldn't be with the White Witch now," Edmund pointed out.

"There must be something we can do," Susan cried, pulling her knees to her chest and weeping into them. "But oh...oh...I know there's nothing...this is all because of me. I was given so many warnings...I've been such a fool. Oh..."

"Courage, Su," Edmund said comfortingly as he slipped his arm around her shoulders. "Be brave."

"But what is there to be brave about?" Susan bawled. "Narnia is doomed. Peter is doomed. I almost wish I'd died back home when the bombs were falling. Then I shouldn't have lived to cause this."

Lucy took out her handkerchief and gave it to Susan. "I know what to do."

"You do?" Edmund and Susan gasped at the same time.

"Yes," Lucy told them. "There is still one person greater than the witch who can help us."

"Whom are you speaking of, Lu?" Edmund blinked at her in confusion.

"Oh, Ed!" Lucy said in an almost reproachful tone. "Don't you know? Aslan is still here! He must be. Didn't Peter say he spoke to him the day before Susan went to visit Tumnus? Surely he didn't leave Narnia already. All we have to do is find him and ask how we are to save Peter."

"But supposing he says there's no way?" Edmund said weakly. "Do you think we could stand it?"

"He won't say that," Lucy said firmly. "Really, he won't. Aslan will help. He'll tell us how to stop the White Witch."

"I hope you're right, Lucy," Edmund sighed.

Lucy found his doubt irritating. "Edmund, don't you remember how he saved you all those years ago? Mightn't he have a way to save Peter now as well?"

"But the situation is so different," Edmund reminded her. "Peter isn't a traitor. The witch's claim to him isn't the same as her claim to me all those years ago."

"But let's go find Aslan and ask anyway," Lucy insisted, standing up and heading for the stairs leading up into the back of the wardrobe in Susan's bed chamber.

"What do you think?" Edmund asked Susan.

Susan wiped the last of her tears away and said, "I don't feel as if there's much hope but I think Lucy's plan is the only thing we'll be able to come up with and even that is better than nothing."

"Very well then." Edmund gave in, turning to Lucy now. "We'll grab what we need and go to see him right away." He paused for a moment. "Bother!"

"What is it?" Lucy asked, her left foot lifted up into the first step.

"I've just realized we don't know where to look for Aslan." Edmund groaned. "We haven't got a clue as to where he might be."

"Maybe he can find us." Lucy clung to her hope tightly and refused to let go. "We can't just let the witch take Peter like this."

"We've already wasted so much time." Susan sighed. "I do wish we hadn't fallen asleep."

"There's nothing we can do about that now," Edmund pointed out, following Lucy up the steps and motioning for Susan to join them. "Let's just grab what we need and go."

When she saw her chamber again, Susan found it to be rather painful. There were several traces of the events of the past night. The windows and mirror were reduced to pieces of shattered glass glowing in the mid-morning sunlight sending rainbows of light to the opposite wall. The bed covers were still ruffled. The accursed candle was only half a candle now. The rest of it was a pile of cold wax fused to the bottom of the silver holder. In spite of the shinning sun, the air was chilly, and Susan felt very much like she was standing in a ruin rather than in the room she had called her own. Peter's nightshirt wasn't on the bed. He must have either been wearing it when he went out to meet the witch or else have taken it with him. Susan bit her lip to keep from bursting into tears again.

She quickly gathered up all she would need. Her golden wreath-crown which was one of the few objects in the room that wasn't broken, the horn (if only she could blow it and call Peter back to her now!), the fur coat and clothes she'd brought with her on the first day, Lucy's scissors, the bow and arrows, and of course she kept Peter's sword, unable to leave it behind. It was the last thing he had given her.

Edmund and Lucy had gone to quickly search the rest of the castle to get to see if the servants were alright. While they were gone, Susan dressed herself in a simple Narnian gown (she felt uneasy changing in the destroyed room but took it in stride as paying a penance). Then she tied Peter's sword and the horn to her waist belt. She finished by tossing everything else into a sack to carry along with her, except for the fur coat which she slipped on over her clothing. Not only would it keep her warm, it would also hide the sword from anyone who might ask about it.

Edmund and Lucy returned to fetch her and brought terrible news with them. They couldn't find a single one of the servants.

"We searched every corner," Edmund lamented, hanging his head. "Not a single person."

"Did she...?" Susan shuddered, attempting to get the words out. "I mean, she must have...turned them to stone?"

Edmund shook his head. "Not all of them."

"The only statues we found were two of the dwarfs," Lucy told her. "Everyone else seems to have vanished."

"Where could they be?" Susan wondered aloud.

"They could be anywhere," Edmund said grimly. "My guess is that most of them were either captured or possibly fled the castle. There isn't a soul left in Cair Paravel other than the three of us."

"The four of us, King Edmund." A deep rich voice chimed in from behind.

Standing there in the chamber with them was Aslan himself. His golden fur shone brightly and his eyes were lovely in spite of being dark and grave.

"Oh, Aslan!" Lucy cried happily, throwing her arms around him and nuzzling his mane with her face. "You've come to save us."

Susan gulped. She had heard a lot about Aslan, but this was the first time she had ever seen him. He seemed so much more wonderful even than Lucy had made him out to be. Yet he also seemed so much more terrible. She wondered what he would do to her for what she had done to Peter.

His eyes met hers. "Susan, daughter of Eve," he addressed her.

She took a step towards him and bowed. "Aslan."

"I know what you want to ask me, which is why I came to you first," Aslan explained. "But tell me, why is it that you looked upon his face in spite of the warnings given to you?"

"I don't even know anymore!" Susan cried out passionately. "It made sense at the time, honest. I didn't want to hurt him. I love him." Her eyes filled with tears again.

Aslan took a step towards her and licked her forehead. His breath felt warm and comforting. He rubbed his face against hers soothingly. When he stopped and pulled away from her, he asked, "There child, do you feel any braver or stronger now?"

"A little, Aslan," Susan admitted.

Aslan nodded. "Good."

"Is there a way to get Peter back?" Edmund finally asked. He had a feeling that it would be best to ask even though Aslan already knew what they wanted.

Aslan opened his mouth to speak and everyone held their breath. They desperately wanted him to say that there was indeed a way for Peter to be saved but were so afraid that he might say that there wasn't.

"Yes," He said finally. "There is one way."

"Please tell us!" Lucy begged, looking up at the Lion eagerly.

"If you can get her to renounce her claim to him, he is free for ever," Aslan told them. "If you cannot, he is fated to be with her until the end of his days."

Edmund face fell. "But how could we ever get her to willingly give him up?"

"You are clever," Aslan reminded them. "You could think of a way to trick her."

"Do you think we can do it, Aslan?" Susan wanted to know.

Aslan's lion lips curled up into a smile. "Yes."

"But how will we get to her palace?" Susan now asked, realizing that she didn't even know the way.

"I will blow the three of you to a secret place here in Narnia," Aslan told them. "When you arrive you will find someone there to help you." He took a step back and blew.

His breath picked all three of them up at once (Susan was still holding her sack) and they sailed out the window, away from Cair Paravel, to some far off place that only Edmund had ever even visited before.

Then they hung over a wide river.

Quite suddenly, the Lion's breath they'd been riding on dropped them into the water. Lucy kicked off her shoes and swam to the surface along with the others. A current almost carried her away, but Susan and Edmund grabbed onto her arms and pulled her onto the shore. At this point, Susan almost lost hold of her sack but managed to regain her grip on it at the last second.

"Where are we?" Susan asked, looking around at the strange forest they found themselves in.

"This must be the secret place that Aslan mentioned," Lucy said almost cheerfully.

"Which way do we go?" Edmund wondered aloud.

"There's a path right in front of us," Susan pointed out. Everywhere off the path, the trees grew much too tightly together to travel safely through them.

They walked along for what seemed like hours. Lucy's short legs almost gave way; Edmund and Susan had to take turns letting her piggy-back on them for the last few miles. When it was finally over, they came to a clearing where a delightfully warm fire burned brightly in a nice clean pit blocked off by smooth gray stones. Sitting next to the fire was a pretty-faced middle-aged woman. She held her hands up to the flames letting the warmth lick the tips of her lacy-white fingers. She heard a twig snap and spun around.

Edmund, Lucy, and Susan stood there, gaping at her. They were dripping wet. Susan's damp coat was bunched up making her look very much like a half-starved wet bear.

"Oh you poor dears!" exclaimed the woman. She shook her hands at them urging them to come forward. "Come and warm yourselves by the fire."

They wobbled over to her. Lucy slid off of Edmund's back and grabbed onto his and Susan's hands walking in between the two of them. Somehow none of them doubted that they could trust the woman.

There was something kind and gentle about her face. Also Aslan had told them that someone would be there to help them and they assumed that this must be that someone.

"I know you..." Edmund whispered shakily, staring at the woman, unable to tear his eyes away from her. "From somewhere... Haven't we met before?"

The woman touched the side of his face. "Yes, my darling, we have."

"But where?" Edmund asked, feeling that he really must know. He could just barely remember the woman's face. It was like someone from a dream. A distant memory.

She didn't answer him. Looking down at Lucy she whispered, "Oh my, you must be my sweet little baby. How big you've gotten!"

Lucy gazed at the woman. She felt that she liked her very much, but unlike Edmund couldn't remember ever seeing her before. All she could manage to say was, "My name's Lucy."

"Did the high king and the witch come this way?" Susan blurted out.

The woman gave her a gentle glance. "You must be the one who should have had him."

"Yes, that's me," Susan admitted, taking a step closer to the woman. The hilt of the sword stuck out from under her coat and the woman smiled when she saw it.

"What is it?" Lucy asked her, realizing that she was deep in thought about something.

"He's given her his sword." The woman sighed. "You are indeed who you say you are. I will help you rescue my son."

"Your son?" they all gasped out at once.

"You'd all better sit down," the woman said, taking a seat on the ground by the fire. "There's so much more I'm meant to tell you."


	16. Up a cliff without a paddle

Once they'd all sat down next to the fire and dried off a bit, the woman explained herself.

"Children." She looked at Edmund and Lucy with a warm expression. "I am your mother, Queen Helen."

"Mother?" Edmund gazed at her in awe. "Where have you been?"

"I have been waiting," she said simply. "Waiting here."

"Waiting for us?" Lucy crinkled her brow in confusion. "But how did you know?"

"I didn't _know,_ " Helen confessed. "but I had the most horrible feeling that this would happen one day. I pleaded with Aslan to make a way that if the daughter of Eve should fail to break the spell, I should be able to help her reach my son and rescue him. Together we made a plan. He was to blow me away to this secret place. It can only be reached if you ride Aslan's breath to the river mouth. The White Witch has never ridden it and would never discover me here."

Edmund leapt up from his place, threw his arms around his mother, and embraced her tightly. "I thought you were lost for ever!"

"No my sweet boy," Helen whispered softly. "I only did this to save Narnia. And I dare say Peter did a good job raising you and the baby."

"Lucy," Lucy corrected her. "My name is Lucy."

Helen smiled at her. "Forgive me, dear. I still think of you as a baby since that is what you were last time I saw you."

"It's alright, mother." It felt so wonderfully delightful to say 'mother'. Lucy had never been given the chance to say it before.

"That's my good girl." Helen sighed, pulling her into the embrace along with her brother.

Susan watched the reunion quietly. She didn't say a word. But she did think a great deal. She thought, hoped, and prayed that Helen would be able to undo the harm her curiosity had forced on Peter.

"Where do you live, Mother?" Edmund asked Helen as soon as they all pulled away from each other.

Helen pointed to a small cottage stationed behind four tall trees a little ways off. "That has been my house for nearly nine years now. Once you are all warmed up enough, I shall take you there." She then turned to Susan. "You poor thing," she said mournfully. "You've such a sweet face. I do wish you had waited a little longer."

Susan started to cry again. "So do I."

"Come now." Helen put her arm around her in a comforting fashion. "You didn't mean to hurt him. I know you didn't."

"How?" Helen was right of course, but Susan wondered exactly how much instinct could really tell her even if she was Peter's long lost mother.

"The sword," Helen explained, glancing down at Susan's waist. "Before I was to leave, I visited my eldest son one last time, taking care that he would not know that I would be going. I told him that if some day a daughter of Eve came to Cair Paravel and did not break the spell, he must not leave her empty-handed. I made him promise me that if she was a good person, he was to give her his sword before leaving. If she was a bad person who purposefully hurt him, he was to give her an old rusted pocket knife."

"But why?" Lucy asked, listening carefully but not quite understanding the point of the story.

"So that I would know if she was worthy of my help or if I should assist only my own children," Helen explained.

Susan wondered if that meant that he still loved her. His last word to her had been, 'I won't make that mistake again' and yet he had given her the sword, not the pocket knife. What did that mean? Clearly it meant he still thought she was a good person. But how good? Did he still care about her? If he had known the reason his mother had asked him to give his sword to her, would he still have done it?

Although it explained a lot, it gave more questions and mysteries as well. Susan was getting rather fed up with mysteries.

Later, when they'd dried off, Helen took them into her cottage as she had promised. It was a snug cozy little one-roomed house with a tiny black wood-stove for warmth and a small kitchen table with four little three-legged stools around it (clearly she'd been ready for them for a long time).

"Now you must have something to eat," Helen told them, lifting the lid of what they'd assumed to be an ordinary chair propped next to the window for reading light, revealing it to be a truck of some sort. She pulled out a long silk table cloth which she spread out on the table in front of them.

"It's lovely!" exclaimed Lucy, stroking the soft folds of the fabric, and looking up at her mother excitedly.

"It's more than that," Helen said with a little smirk forming on her face. She raised her hands over the cloth and clapped.

Right away, platters full of fine food and drink appeared on the cloth. There were roast chickens, salads, lamb, glazed pork, wild boar, and even a plate of fresh trout. There was also wine, juice, water, and bread rolls to help it all go down.

Edmund licked his lips.

Lucy let out a squeal of delight.

When Susan recovered from the shock of it simply appearing there unexpectedly, she finally said, "It looks delicious."

"Have some." Helen urged them to eat as she sat down on her own stool, picked up a piece of trout and placed it in her own mouth to show them that it was perfectly good.

That was enough for Edmund. He quickly started inhaling the rolls, boar, and chicken, washing it down with two glasses of water.

Lucy ate the chicken, rolls, and half of the salad. She had the juice to drink.

Helen and Susan drank the wine and ate mostly trout and rolls. When they were finished, Helen told her to clap her hands over the cloth again. Susan did so, and instantly all the dirty plates and food scraps left behind disappeared as if they had never been there before, leaving only the shimmering clean cloth.

Because they'd all eaten with their fingers and no silverware, their hands were quite dirty, so Helen led them to a little well out back where they could wash up. Once that was taken care of, she folded the cloth and put it in Susan's sack. She tried to protest but Helen insisted that she wouldn't allow them to starve, knowing well that she couldn't count on the witch to give them anything.

Next she lifted the top of a garden seat close to the well and pulled out a pair of dark brown boots and a thick black harness. She handed these to Edmund, who looked at them and then back at her with a confused expression on his face.

"The White Witch's castle now is located on the top of a high cliff," Helen told them gravely. "She made the land under it grow so that you could not seek Peter after she had taken him away."

"But how are we to get to the top?" Susan asked her.

"Those are not regular, run of the mill boots," Helen said, looking at Edmund again. "They can climb up any hill, cliff, or mountain no matter how steep, as long as they remain dry at all times. They also make the wearer strong enough to climb anything no matter how much they might be carrying."

"I see!" Lucy exclaimed. "Edmund will climb the cliff carrying Su and I in the harness all the way to the top!"

"That's my bright girl." Helen grinned at her, beaming with pride.

Edmund looked a little unsure. "Are you in earnest, mother?"

"Yes, my son." She nodded to assure him that she was.

"But what will we do when we reach the castle?" Susan asked, feeling very nervous now that there was some chance of getting close to it.

"You must go in and save Peter of course." Helen almost laughed in surprise. "What else did you think you'd be doing there?"

"But what of the witch's claim to him?" Edmund reminded her. "We can't just go in and take him out. She'll turn us all to stone for sure."

"My dears, I don't mean for you to barge in there and grab him. Only a fool would do that. Use your wit and cunning to get in and out safely."

Susan wished there was more advice than just that. Didn't anyone have a plan? Wasn't there some sure-fire strategy for saving him? Well, no matter what, she vowed to herself that she wouldn't stop until he was safely away from the White Witch. Even if she should kill herself in the attempt. But that didn't mean that Edmund and Lucy should die as well.

"I'll take the boots myself," Susan told Helen, her voice a little shaky but her determination firm. "Edmund and Lucy can stay with you."

"The boots are too big for you," Helen said, as she slipped them on Edmund's feet and started to lace them up. "They weren't made for slender young girls to wear. They'll fit Edmund though."

"Then Lucy will stay with you," Susan decided.

"I will not!" Lucy cried out, upset that she was the one being left behind. "I want to help save Peter too."

"Lucy, it's too dangerous," Susan reminded her. "Peter would never forgive me if anything happened to you, and what's more, I would never forgive myself either."

"It's my own choice." Lucy refused to give in. She appealed to her mother. "Please, tell them to let me come."

Helen was worried about her youngest child being in the witch's castle but knew that she could not hold her back. She could tell that Lucy was a strong willed girl and that she wouldn't rest while the others did the rescuing.

"Lucy, you will go with them but promise me that you will not go off on your own anywhere in that castle without Edmund or Susan with you. If you wont agree to that, you'll have to stay here with me," Helen told her.

"I promise," Lucy said.

Out of a little nap-sack, Helen pulled out a diamond flask containing a red liquid and placed it in Lucy's right hand. "This cordial is made from a rare fire flower, one drop will cure any injury." Then she pulled out a small sharp danger wrapped in a copper plating and placed it in her daughter's other hand. "Although I hope you will never have to use it."

"Thank you," Lucy whispered. For the first time in all her life, she was getting gifts from her mother.

Helen then took Edmund and Lucy by the hands-Susan followed just behind-and led them all to a narrow dirt road a little ways off from the cottage.

"Follow the road until you reach the cliff," Helen instructed them. "And Edmund, whatever you do, make sure the boots do not get wet."

"Yes, Mother." Edmund kissed her goodbye on the cheek.

"Goodbye, mother." Lucy gave her one last hug.

"Goodbye, your majesty," Susan said to Helen. "Thank you for everything."

Helen smiled and stroked her chin tenderly. "I hope the next time we meet you will be able to call me mother."

Susan hoped so too. She still loved Peter and wanted to marry him, but there was little hope in that. All she could think to say was what most parents tell their children when they want something they can't have: "We'll see."

Together, the three of them traveled the road for nearly two days, making only the most necessary stops for spreading out the cloth to eat as well as to take a short nap here and there so that they didn't expire.

At long last they came to the cliff.

Looking up and squinting very hard, one could just catch a glimpse of a dismal-looking ice castle glowing a weak skim-milk blue calling to mind the colour of stars before they burn out and die.

Edmund gulped when he saw how steep and jagged the hill was. What if he should fail to reach the top with both girls in tow? If they should all fall to their deaths, the witch's triumph would be complete with no hope of anyone ever saving Peter from his terrible fate.

Once the straps of the harness were tied securely around the waists and abdomens of Lucy and Susan, Edmund fixed the clasp and extra straps that would bind them to him. With all the bravery he could muster up, he lifted his foot and started climbing up the cliff.

It was a slow but steady decent and the boots made it much easier than it would have been otherwise. Edmund only had to keep his hands on the right rocks. His feet needed no guide other than the soles of the boots, which always seemed to know what step to take and when.

When they were almost to the top, Edmund heard a sound that he prayed wasn't what he thought it must be. It was a little _drip-drip_ sound.

"Isn't that water?" Lucy asked worriedly as the thin trickle came down the rocks and came dangerously close to Edmund's boots.

Edmund quickly tried to move out of the way of the falling water but to no avail because he found his feet hitting and even bigger one from the other side. Now wet, the boots stopped working and caused Edmund to stumble. To avoid falling down, he had to grab onto the closest rocks and hang there for dear life. They were sharp and cut him right below the palms making blood flow down passed his wrists. His fingers started to cramp up and give way. He kicked desperately with his feet, hoping to shake off some of the water. The whole harness shook as he almost slipped and sent himself, Lucy, and Susan to an early grave.

Susan let out a cry of terror. "Edmund!"

He wanted to answer her but found that nothing would come out of his mouth. Beads of sweat were trickling down his forehead. He couldn't climb another step and yet he couldn't hang there forever. Just when it seemed that they were all going to die, a long rope was tossed down to them from above.

Grabbing onto it, Edmund let out a slight grunt and hoped that whomever was pulling them up from the other end wouldn't hurt them when they reached the top.


	17. A failed plan

The rope burned Edmund's already chapped and bleeding hands and made them smart. He felt tears come up into his eyes but they mixed with the beads of sweat that his face was still drenched with until he couldn't tell the two moistures apart.

Lucy and Susan shut their eyes unable to think or move. They held their breath as the rope dragged them closer and closer to the top. Would someone kind and helpful be there once they reached it or would it be someone hard and cruel who was only toying with them now and would drop them at any second?

Listening carefully, Lucy thought she heard the sound of a hoof striking a rock. Whomever was at the top had to have an animal with them. Most likely a horse. But it might just as easily be a donkey or a goat. Not that it really mattered anyway.

With a slight _plop_ and the sounds of gasping and wheezing, they found themselves at the top.

"Whomever you are, this is as far as you go," a strong rumble-like voice above them said in a firm no-nonsense tone. "Only King Peter and Queen Jadis are welcome to pass this way."

Looking up, they saw that the speaker was a tall dark centaur with a black and white striped horse-half and a very muscular human half. There was another centaur standing just behind him also with dark human skin but with an all-black horse half. He wore a large brimmed sun hat for shade which was tied under his chin with a raggedy scrap of cloth.

"We're his family, and she's his betrothed," Lucy told them, pointing in Susan's direction.

"Lucy!" Edmund scolded, not thinking it wise that she was freely sharing that information.

"Don't worry Edmund, I think they're nice centaurs," Lucy said compassionately. "After all they pulled us up."

The centaur with the sun hat took it off and bowed to them.

The one that that spoken before spoke again, "Thank goodness you've come! The wedding takes place in less than a fortnight."

"Then you'll help us?" Lucy asked to be sure.

"Oh, yes my queen," the first centaur spoke once more. "We are true Narnians. We once belonged to the court of your father, King Frank. The White Witch kidnapped us many years ago. We've been forced to work here at her bidding ever since."

The one with the sun hat looked at Susan and spoke at last. "The one who should have had him." He clicked his tongue in disappointment. "If only you had not looked at him. Narnia would likely have been free as soon as its high king was. We too might have been among those saved."

"Don't speak so harshly to the lass, Hishtack," the first centaur defended her. "I always thought the conditions of the spell weren't fair on any maiden. To have to share a bed with someone you never saw? Frightful!"

"I don't think it would have been so terrible, Freedial," Hishtack insisted. "Only for a year. Anyone could bare anything for such a short time."

"You think all time is short," Feedial snorted, tossing his head back in disagreement. "But there now. We won't speak of it at this moment. We must hide them before the witch learns they're here."

"Do you think you could get us into the castle?" Edmund asked them.

"The youngest might pass for a dwarf," Hishtack said without thinking.

Lucy pouted. She wasn't _that_ short!

"No offence," he quickly added, chuckling a little.

"If we dressed you in rags we might lead into and your brother into the kitchen," Freedial mused.

"But what about Susan?" Edmund asked.

Staring at the castle, Susan suddenly got an idea. "Don't take me in through the kitchen with the other two. Take me to the wall below wherever the White Witch's chamber is."

"What?" Edmund gasped in disbelief. "Have you lost your mind? She'll see you!"

"Exactly," Susan said, a slow smile starting to creep onto her face.

"What are you thinking of, Su?" Lucy asked her.

"I'm thinking that you both go in through the kitchen way as planned, keep an eye on things, and see if you can find any useful information that might help us save Peter," Susan explained. "Don't worry about me. I have a plan."

"I don't know about this," Hishtack said as he reached for Susan's hand so he could pull her up onto his back. "Supposing she turns you to stone the second she sees you?"

"Oh, she won't," Susan said, with much more self-confidence than she actually had. In a low breath to herself she added, "I hope."

While on the Centaur's back, she took Lucy's scissors out of her sack and started working with them.

Please let something pretty come out, Susan thought.

 _Snip-snap_ she opened and closed them. In-between the blades was a very lovely scrap of creamy-white satin. It was so smooth and elegant that no one upon a catching sight of it wouldn't wish to own it. She opened and closed them again and it grew longer and shimmering silver thread ran through it. It turned from a scrap to a sleeve, from a sleeve to half a gown, from half a gown, to a full gown. A few more snips and it was finished. It was a white-and-silver gown made from satin, velvet, and silk. It was one of the prettiest articles of clothing that ever existed.

"What on earth is that for?" Hishtack asked her when she showed it to him.

"It's a brib,." Susan told him, putting away the scissors.

"Whom are you bribing?" he asked curiously.

"The witch," Susan said boldly.

"You really think Jadis is interested in clothes?" Hishtack pointed out doubtfully.

"She might not be a lot of things, but she is greedy," Susan reminded him. "She's sure to want anything appealing that isn't rightfully her own."

"I just hope you know what you're doing," Hishtack sighed, as they came to a high tower-lined wall with a small window in the middle of it.

"Is there where the witch lives?" Susan asked to be sure.

Hishtack nodded. "Yes." He helped her off his back and placed her on the ground.

She sat down with her back against the wall. "Thank you for your help."

"You're welcome," he said, preparing to leave. "I have to go now before I am missed at my post. I do hope you end up alright." With that, he galloped away, leaving Susan alone.

Meanwhile, dressed in hooded rags with their hair messed up and wild and their faces darkened with mud and ashes, Lucy and Edmund followed Freedial into the little back door that led to the kitchen.

Before they could do anything or speak to anyone, there was a loud echo of, "She's coming, she's coming!" And everyone raced this way and that, desperate to be seen working when the White Witch arrived lest she become angry and turn them to stone.

"Minions!" she called as she stormed into the room. "How is the food coming?"

"It's coming along wonderfully, your majesty," a shaky-voiced dwarf-girl told her.

"It doesn't smell right," Jadis lied. "Start it over again."

"But we've been cooking for six hours," an elderly male dryad protested. "And it's nearly done."

The witch lifted her wand and turned him to stone. Lucy let out yelp before Edmund could stop her.

She turned and looked at them. Thankfully she didn't recognize them as the royal siblings of the high king. She thought Edmund to only be an over-grown dwarf of some sort and Lucy to perhaps be his wife.

"Let that be a lesson to you," she said severely. "That is what happens to those who get in my way." She walked over to the cooking pot, kicked it and spilled all the food on the ground. "I _said_ , start over." With that, she swept out of the room and down the corridor.

"That was close," Edmund whispered to Lucy. "You should've kept quiet."

"You there!" one of the head servants barked at them. "Don't just stand there, get to work before she kills us all!"

And so, not seeing what else that they could do, they started helping prepare the meal although they weren't sure exactly what they were making. The only tasks given to them were to fetch this spice or that cheese and hand it to those slaving over the pots by the fire.

Jadis went into her own bed chamber and happened to look outside the window. She saw a sight she most certainly didn't expect to see. There was a girl sitting down there whistling to herself, she was folding and unfolding a lovely white gown in her lap. She shook it and held it up as if she was showing it to an invisible person. Seeing no reason why it shouldn't belong to her and not the foolish unwelcome twit below, Jadis came down the stairs that led to the outside and glared at her.

Susan knew the witch was standing behind her but pretended not to notice. She only hoped her pounding heart wouldn't give her away. Would this work or would she be reduced to nothing but a stone maiden holding a dress?

"Give me the gown," Jadis demanded.

Susan turned her head to face her. "Why should I?"

Jadis was nothing short of stunned to see Susan there. How had she made it all the way from Cair Paravel? How had she gotten up the cliff? What exactly did she think she was doing?

"You!" Jadis spluttered angrily.

Susan nodded slowly and hid her fear. She wasn't backing down and she wanted the witch to know that.

Once she'd regained her composure Jadis spoke clearly again. "Give me the gown or I'll turn you into stone." She raised her wand threateningly.

"Go ahead," Susan said calmly.

Jadis paused, taken aback. "What was that?"

"I'll pull the dress close to myself and it'll turn to stone with me," Susan threatened. "You won't have it either way."

Jadis lowered her wand and glared at her. "Alright, what do you want for it?"

"I want you to renounce your claim to Peter," Susan said boldly. "If you do that, the gown is yours."

Jadis broke out into a fit of evil laughter. "You're much too innocent! Do you really think I'd be foolish enough to give up my rights to being queen for a simple dress?"

Susan shook her head. Of course the witch wouldn't give up everything she'd waited so long for in exchange for a gown, no matter how lovely it was. But there was still another thing Susan could ask for.

"I'd rather have a new statue." Jadis raised the wand again.

"Wait!" Susan held up her hands. "I'll give you the gown..." Jadis started to lower her wand. "...But not for nothing."

"Spit it out then," Jadis huffed, getting rather fed up with her. "What will you take for it?"

"Let me spend the night with Peter," Susan said unflinchingly. "Let me stay in his chamber -wherever that is- with him alone all night. Then in the morning, I'll give you the gown."

Jadis's eyes flashed with resentment, clearly she hadn't been expecting her to say that. She raised her wand once more. Susan shut her eyes tightly wondering if it would hurt. When nothing happened, Susan opened one eye and peered up at the witch. She had lowered her wand and didn't look as upset now.

"Fine," she said almost-agreeably. "Come to the main gate at sunset." She turned around and went back into the castle.

Susan breathed a sigh of relief. She hadn't saved Peter yet but now she had a chance to talk with him. Maybe together they could think of something. At the very least she would be able to tell him how sorry she was and beg for his forgiveness.

But where was Peter at this time? He was sitting in a chair by the window on the other side of the castle in the chamber that had been set aside for him. He felt numb and bitter. Nothing mattered. Nothing at all.

Suddenly his chamber door swung open. Jadis walked in. "Peter dear, there you are."

"Where else would I be?" Peter snapped, not even bothering to look at her.

"Are you alright?" She asked in a patronizingly sweet tone.

"Of course I'm not!" Peter lashed out, forgetting how afraid he was of the person he was addressing. "I've been betrayed, taken from my home, it's freezing cold, and my stomach hurts!"

"Poor thing," Jadis whispered, pulling herself closer to him. "Such a pessimist." She started stroking his check with the side of her hand.

Peter wanted to vomit. Her icy touch repelled him. He couldn't believe that in less than two weeks he'd be married to her. He thought he'd rather kill himself first if only he could get his hands on a suitable knife or a long piece of rope. Unfortunately there weren't any dangerous objects in the chamber.

"You've grown up nice, you know," Jadis whispered.

Peter shuddered and tried to pull away from her.

Jadis let out a sigh and took out a small glass bottle from the folds of her dress and placed it in his hands. "Here, drink this."

Peter looked down at it suspiciously. "What is it?"

"It's for your stomach," Jadis lied.

Peter figured it wasn't for anything of the sort, he wished it was poison, but knew that she had no reason to kill him now. She wanted him alive. Whatever it was for, it didn't matter. He took out the cork put it to his lips and drank it. It didn't taste too bad. Sort of watery and bland, but not too bad

.

"How do you feel?" Jadis asked him.

All of a sudden, Peter couldn't keep his eyes open no matter how hard he tried. "I feel...sleepy..." he muttered as his eye lids shut and his body sank back into the chair.

"That's what I thought," Jadis said with a smirk, taking the empty bottle away as she walked out of the room. It was sunset. Susan would be waiting outside by the main gate.

Two wolves and a very ugly hobgoblin opened the gate for Susan to be let in. The wolves growled but they didn't attack. Jadis came and told Susan to follow her. They walked through three different corridors before they finally reached a black wooden side door which Jadis opened and told Susan to go in.

"There you go, he's in there waiting for you." The White Witch's tone was proud and cold. "I'll be back at sunrise." Once Susan was inside, she slammed the door behind her and locked it.

"Are you sure that's such a good idea?" one of the wolves asked his mistress. "What if they plan something?"

"How stupid do you think I am?" Jadis laughed. "Peter is much too tired to talk to guests right now, as she'll soon find out."

Susan didn't even flinch when she heard the door lock behind her. She wasn't a bit afraid because Peter was there too. She could see his arm handing over the side of a chair in the far corner by the window.

"Peter?" Susan said softly. "It's me, Susan."

He didn't stand up to greet her like she'd expected. He didn't even turn to face her.

"Peter?" she tried again, taking a few steps closer.

Nothing. No movement.

When she reached the chair and stood in front of it, she saw what the problem was. He was sleeping. She knew he wasn't dead because his chest moved up and down and he moaned twice.

"Peter?" She placed a hand on his shoulder and tried to shake him awake. "Wake up."

Still nothing.

"Please, get up." Susan pleaded with him, shaking him again. "I'm sorry."

In his state of deep sleep, he couldn't hear a word. If he heard any noise at all, it was only like a light wind. He didn't feel her shaking him either.

She tried everything she could think of to wake him but to no avail. The night ended, dawn came, and Jadis returned.

"You did something to him!" Susan exclaimed furiously, clinging to one of Peter's hands.

"I've kept my end of the bargain. You were in here all night with him as promised, alone. I even locked the doors so none of the servants would enter," Jadis pointed out smugly. "Give me the gown now."

Knowing there was nothing else she could do, Susan gave her the gown. Once the gown was in her possession, Jadis had no more use for Susan. She grabbed her by the hair and dragged her out of the castle ignoring her cries of, "Ow, that hurts!"

Now Susan sat hopelessly on the ground a few feet away from the castle. She pulled her knees to her chest and wept.


	18. Susan the servant

Still working under the guise of a servant, Edmund carried two large chamber pots outside to be dumped. Lucy trailed close behind, struggling to lift a ton of old wash water that also needed to be discarded. She stumbled on a stone step and spilled the water in the wrong direction. The long stream of dirty water trickled away down towards where a girl sat weeping as if her life were over with no hope of ever improving.

"Susan!" Edmund gasped, recognizing her. He placed the chamber pot on the ground and ran to her side. She looked up at him, her eyes flooded with tears and rimmed with bright red rings. "Oh, Su! What happened?"

Ever so sadly, Susan told them about the deal she'd made with the White Witch and how it had been of no use in the end because Jadis had done something to make Peter sleep the whole time.

"Don't cry." Lucy tried to comfort her. "We'll save him somehow."

"We're in the castle now," Edmund reminded her. "We have a better chance."

Susan shook her head doubtfully. How could she have ever thought she could out-smart the witch? It was hopeless.

"Susan, here's what you have to do." Edmund came up with a new plan. "Try to get the her to let you in to see him again tonight."

"What good will that be?" Susan asked. "She'll make him sleep again."

"Lucy and I will try to get a warning to him somehow," Edmund said. "Can you tell us where his room is?"

"Yes, it's-" Susan started before a loud voice calling from one of the castle windows interrupted.

"Hey servant dwarf!" an angry washer woman (who was, by the way, a faun) shouted at Lucy. "You get back here right now and help me clean these sheets before Queen Jadis sees that her bed isn't made yet and sends us all to our deaths!"

"Just a minute!" Lucy called back to her.

"No, not 'just a minute', now!" The washer woman would take no nonsense. "And you, larger dwarf!" She addressed Edmund now. "Don't talk to that maiden. I saw her being dragged from the castle earlier today. Clearly the queen will have our heads if she catches any of us talking to her! Let her alone and safe all our souls!"

Edmund couldn't announce who he really was at the top of his voice without giving himself away to the whole castle. There was nothing else to be done except to grab Lucy's hand and race to the washer woman, help her clean the sheets, and then hope to find Peter's chamber on their own.

With one sad glance at their backs, Susan stood up, brushed herself off and went back to the wall of the witch's chamber. She said with her back against it again and pulled out the scissors. She began to whistle again although rather half-heartedly.

Jadis happened to glance out the window and see her. She couldn't believe her eyes. Was that stupid girl still there? Why hadn't she gone sobbing back to where ever she came from? Preferably jumping off the cliff on the way. Well, she would be easily dealt with. She heard a _snip-snap_. What could that be?

Glancing down again, she realized that Susan was making a fine wool coat. It was the nicest one she'd ever seen before. It looked like it was being done by a skilled craftsman but Susan didn't even use any thread or needles. She didn't need a loom to weave the wool either. The scissors somehow did that all for her.

Jadis stormed down the stairs and stood behind her. "I want those scissors."

Susan looked up at her blankly and blinked twice. "Excuse me?"

"Give me the scissors," Jadis demanded. "Such a useful tool ought to belong to me, the queen of Narnia."

Susan tossed her head and laughed. "Queen of Narnia!"

"Don't laugh at me or else I'll turn you to stone." Jadis raised her wand.

Susan didn't close her eyes this time. She didn't even look frightened. She just stared at the witch, never breaking eye contact.

"Aren't you afraid?" the White Witch asked, feeling rather surprised.

"No, I am not," Susan told her truthfully. Why should she fear dying? It wasn't as if she had a reason to live. As long as Peter was captive, there was no future for him. And as long as there was no future for him, there was no future for her either. Why should a person with no future care if their nothingness is taken away from them?

"Give me the scissors," Jadis said again, stretching out her hand to take them.

"I'm afraid they'll only work for me," Susan lied, making her eyes widen with faux-innocence.

"Fine then," Jadis said, glaring very hard at her. "Then I want to you make the clothes for my wedding."

Susan laughed bitterly. Was Jadis out of her mind? "Why should I help you marry the man I'm betrothed to?"

"If you will make the wedding clothes, I'll let you stay in his chamber again tonight," Jadis offered.

Seeing no other way to get into the castle again, Susan agreed to make the wedding clothes although the thought of helping prepare a wedding for Peter and Jadis sickened her.

Jadis glanced back down at the coat. "I want the coat as well."

"I won't part with it for nothing," Susan reminded her.

"What do you want for it?" Jadis rolled her eyes in annoyance.

"Peter's freedom?" Susan tried again.

"Besides that," growled Jadis, spinning her wand around threateningly, hoping to reinstate some level of self-preservation in Susan so that she would fear her again.

"After the night ends, you don't throw me out of the castle," Susan came up with. "I want to be allowed to stay on with the servants but to come and go as I please."

Jadis thought it over. "I won't have you rushing around trying to ruin my wedding plans."

"What if I promise to speak only to the dwarfs?" Susan offered, knowing that's that they thought Edmund and Lucy were.

"I will agree to that and you may come and go as you please, but whenever you are in the castle, unless I personally send for you, you are not to leave the downstairs hall. I wont have you in any of the upper chambers." Jadis made her final offer.

Susan was disappointed. Peter's chamber was an upper chamber. Which meant she had no hope of sneaking in to see him while he was awake. Still, it was better than nothing and she readily agreed.

"Come to the gates at sunset," Jadis told her. "Bring the coat and scissors with you."

Meanwhile, Edmund and Lucy had no luck finding Peter's chamber. They had very little time to look because the other servants were always in a terrible tizzy about this or that thing that Jadis would hate to learn of and kill them all for and always made them work. They assumed Peter would be somewhere upstairs where they were rarely allowed to go and tried everything they could to get up there. Once, they raced away from their duties throwing caution to the wind. They were chased by wolves back to the servants quarters where the other servants were waiting to yell at them. So, needless to say, they didn't get the warning to Peter.

Jadis came in as she had the day before with the sleeping drink in the bottle. "Is your stomach feeling better today, dear?"

Peter had to admit that until Jadis had walked in, it had been a little better. Now he was feeling sick again. He wished she'd leave. "Yes, a little," he said hurriedly, hoping to get her out quicker.

"It's because of what I gave you yesterday," Jadis lied, grabbing into his arm, pulling his hand towards her and placing a glass bottle in the palm of it. "Drink it again and you'll be much better in no time."

Peter didn't want to drink it. It made him feel groggy the last time and he'd woken up with a rather beastly headache that had taken hours to go away. But Jadis stared at him, refusing to leave until he drank it. In the end he sighed, took a deep breath, and swallowed it in one gulp. His head felt so heavy that he had to rest it on his left shoulder and then his eye lids snapped shut.

"Sleep tight," Jadis laughed, leaving him fast asleep in the room once more.

As on the night before, Jadis took Susan to Peter's chamber and locked the door. And once more, Susan tried to awaken him. Nothing worked. he didn't hear her pleas and he didn't feel her tears.

An hour before dawn, knowing she was going to be taken away soon, Susan sat on the chair, gently nudging him to the side to make a little room for herself. She rested her head on his shoulder. She was very tired herself. Two nights now without sleep. She wondered if this would be her last moment with him. She couldn't think of anything else to bribe the witch with and surely things wouldn't keep on going like this for ever. Sooner or later, someone was going to have to win, and Susan shuddered to think that that someone might be Jadis.

She had only meant to close her eyes for a moment and rest as peacefully as possible with the one she might have married if she hadn't taken Katie and Simon's advice and used the tinderbox, but being as worn out as she was, she was soon nearly as sound asleep as Peter. What woke her was someone pulling her up out of the chair by her hair.

"It's time for you to leave," Jadis snapped, showing no mercy as she yanked Susan out of the room and down the stairs to the servant's quarters.

"This girl will be one of you now," she told the bewildered-faced servants who wondered who the pretty young lady could possibly be. "Find her something to do but make sure she has enough time to make suitable wedding clothes for myself and Peter." She thrust Susan towards them, finally letting go of her hair.

Susan tumbled to the ground at one of the head-servant's feet. Turning her head, she could see Jadis storming away out of the corner of her eye.

Lucy and Edmund had been shelling peas in the corner of the room and had seen what Jadis had done to her. They raced over and helped her to her feet.

"Su, are you alright?" Lucy whispered in her ear.

"No..." Susan mumbled softly. She wasn't alright at all.

"You were in Peter's chamber again?" Edmund whispered in her other ear.

Susan nodded and closed her eyes.

"We couldn't find him yesterday," Edmund whisper-explained.

"So I gathered," Susan said bitterly but not unkindly.

All day, Susan worked carrying heavy buckets of water and helping Edmund and Lucy shell peas and peal potatoes. The only free minutes she was given were filled with using her scissors to make Jadis's wedding gown. Susan had hoped something utterly hideous would come out of them but much to her grave disappointment, the ashen silver-beaded fabric was disgustingly beautiful. And it was long enough for Jadis too. She'd look gorgeous at her wedding and Susan would be in the kitchen cutting open sacks of rice.

At supper that night, the servants complained about the food they were given.

"Scraps from the witch's table!" they grumped, shuffling over to their little cracked stools where they sat to eat. "And not good scraps either, the wolves are given much finer cuts of meat than anyone at this horrible place would ever throw to us."

Susan took Helen's silk cloth out of her sack and spread it out on the partly-broken table in front of her. She clapped over it and the finest food appeared.

"Oh!" the others gasped. "It's much better than anything even the witch herself has to eat."

Edmund and Lucy felt free to take part in the meal the cloth had provided and the other servants meekly asked if they too could have some. Susan nodded and they all crowded around her eagerly. Good food at last.

But just as they were about to start eating, Jadis came storming into the kitchen, her eyes flashing angrily. "Where did you get all of these things?" She demanded, eyeing the sliver platters being passed around.

Not wanting to be turned to stone and desperate to save their own skins, the servants pointed to Susan.

Somewhat shaken by how quickly the servants had sold her out, Susan stood up and looked at Jadis.

They stared at each other for a moment neither willing to be the first to break eye contact. Both were determined and wanted to seem strong.

"Where did you get the food?" Jadis demanded coldly, finally looking away so she could motion to the banquet that was now spread out on the table.

"I clapped over the cloth and it appeared," Susan explained honestly.

"I want the cloth," Jadis said without hesitation.

"I'm afraid it will only work for m-" Susan started.

"Fine then you will be in charge of the food served at my wedding as well," Jadis announced, clapping her hands together in a dismissive way.

The food disappeared when she clapped and the cloth was clean.

She glared at Susan furiously. "You little liar!" She raised her wand.

"The food will only appear for me," Susan quickly came up with and blurted out, surprising herself at how easy lying could be when you were under stress. "It will disappear for anyone."

The White Witch's expression looked a little less hard but it didn't exactly soften. "You had better be telling the truth." She took a step towards her. "For your own sake." Then she shook her head and turned to leave.

"I won't prepare the food for nothing!" Susan called after her.

Jadis turned around again. "What do you want?"

"What do you think?" Susan folded her arms across her chest, growing a little tired of this routine conversation of theirs.

"You may sleep in Peter's chamber tonight," Jadis gave in, fully prepared to give him the sleeping drink again.

"One more thing," Susan started, hoping her sudden burst of courage wouldn't give way when she needed it most. "To make sure Peter's wedding clothes fit, I'll have to try them on him and he can't be asleep."

Jadis clenched her jaw angrily. The little twit was smart! She would persist in trying to talk to Peter until it was allowed. But the White Witch wasn't going to let her win. She would teach her a thing or two. She'd do something to scare off that stupid girl. A wicked smile came across her face.

"Come and see him tonight, bring the clothes with you," Jadis told Susan, her smirk growing wider and wider as she spoke. "In the morning, I'll see to it that he wakes up and tries on the clothes."

Susan nodded. "I'll come."

"See you then," The witch said, clearly holding back a laugh.

That witch is planning something dreadful, Edmund thought, shuddering to himself. He could tell that whatever she had in mind was going to be far worse than simply making him sleep again. They had to do something to stop her, but what?

Seeing that no one's eyes were on him, Edmund leaned over to Susan and whispered. "Stay with Lucy, I'll be right back."

"Where are you going?" Susan whispered to him.

"Just stay with Lucy," Edmund whispered sharply, not because he was cross with her but because he was nervous.

"Alright," Susan said, looking over at the head servants worried that they might notice if he wasn't there when they needed him for something. "I'll cover for you."

"Thanks," Edmund said gratefully.

Making sure his hood was securely over his face so that the witch wouldn't know him for the high king's brother if she happened to see him, Edmund crept out of the room just in time to see where Jadis was headed. He carefully followed her and two of her dwarfs (these worked for her willingly because their hearts were wicked, not because they were forced to serve her) down the corridor. Somehow he knew that something worth knowing about was going to happen.


	19. Forgiven drops of tallow

Edmund continued to follow Jadis until she and her dwarfs came into a long narrow room lined with shelves.

On the shelves, there were glass bottles of all shapes and sizes. The bottles were filled with strange liquids of many different colours; some were dark and muddy-looking in texture, others were as clear as fresh rain-water.

Edmund quickly stationed himself behind a tall curtain hanging from a dark drafty corner. No one had any reason to look that way, so he could listen and watch them safely.

Jadis reached up and took one of the smallest bottles down. She smiled at it. "This will scare off that little idiot."

"Another sleeping drink?" one of the dwarfs said flatly. He didn't seem very impressed. "That's it? Didn't we try that already?"

"You dim-witted fool!" the witch exclaimed. "You completely underestimate me." She proudly held up the bottle to the small trickle of light in the room so that it shone just a little. "This is more than just a sleeping drink. It'll also be a good attitude-adjuster. I don't know if you've noticed that my soon to be husband is a little too...nice...? That isn't going to work out. Not with my plans to make Narnia a country worth seeing."

"It does what now?" The other dwarf was confused.

"It'll make him sleep all night just like the other drink did," Jadis said in a tone that suggested she was more than a little exasperated that she had to slow down and explain herself. "Then in the morning, when he wakes up...let's just say our dear high king wont be quite so...reasonable...as he used to be."

"It makes him evil then?" the first dwarf double checked.

"That may the be the quickest you've ever caught on to anything," Jadis said in a cold sarcastic tone. "Bravo."

Edmund felt his stomach knotting up and a chill running through his veins. Jadis was kicking her conquest up a notch. If Peter was evil and cruel, it would be even easier for her to convince him to do her bidding. His brother would soon be replaced by a wicked tyrant unrecognizable as the High King Peter they had once known.

"Wait until that silly little girl sees the way he treats her when he wakes up," Jadis laughed, more to herself than to the dwarfs. "She'll be fleeing this place in no time." Then she took a silver tray of food off of a nearby table and handed it to the first dwarf. "I'll give him the drink just before she comes in tonight. For now, just take his meal up to him."

"As my queen commands," said the dwarf, as he bowed and walked out of the room.

Edmund trailed after him, being careful not to make a sound until they were at the doorway to Peter's bed chamber. He waited a moment for the dwarf to unlock it and then picked up a corner-display sword and whacked him over the head with the hilt it. The dwarf didn't see it coming and fainted instantly.

"That was surprisingly easy." Edmund shrugged to himself, taking the tray out of the unconscious dwarf's hands and nudging the door open with his elbow.

Peter was lying on the bed, flat on this back, looking blankly up at the ceiling. He barely reacted when the door opened. Oh, great another meal. He wondered how long it would take to starve himself. He couldn't marry the witch if he died from lack of food and water. But then, she might force him to eat. How would she do that? He didn't know but he wasn't sure he wanted to find out either.

The dwarf bringing the food was unusually tall. He was dressed in ragged clothing. He must be one of the kitchen staff. Because most of the kitchen staff was made up of loyal Narnians, Jadis almost never let any of them come in to see him. He wondered why this one was there now.

Peter sat up and looked at him. "Hullo."

Edmund placed the tray down and took a step closer to the bed side. He reached up and pulled the hood off his head revealing his face. "Hullo, Peter."

"Edmund?" Peter gasped, jumping up and rushing over to his little brother. He reached out and wiped a dark clump of mud-and-ashes off of his face to be sure that it was really him. It was. "What are you doing here?" He hugged his little brother tightly. Part of being the older brother was both wanting to smack your younger sibling for putting them self in danger and wanting to embrace them for being so brave.

"We've come to rescue you," Edmund told him.

"We?" Peter raised an eyebrow in surprise.

"Me, Lucy, and Susan," Edmund explained happily.

Peter's face lit up. "Susan's here? She didn't go back to Spare Oom?"

"Of course not!" Edmund exclaimed, surprised that Peter would think even for a moment that Susan would do that to him. "Did you really think she would just leave after what happened?"

"Jadis told me she went home," Peter said softly, looking as though he might cry. "I didn't want to believe her...but I just kept thinking that maybe Susan didn't love me anymore and because she was so frightened...I did pretty much tell her to her face that our relationship was a mistake..."

"Peter, she's been in this chamber with you for the past two nights!" Edmund blurted out unable to take it anymore.

Peter's jaw dropped and his expression looked somewhere between amazed and perplexed. Almost like he'd been punched in the guts. "She _what_?"

"It's the witch," Edmund said furiously. "She's been giving you something that makes you sleepy. Susan couldn't wake you up."

"I can't believe Susan was here." Peter spoke as though he was in a trance. "Where is she now?"

"In the servant quarters making clothes for your wedding to Jadis," Edmund said with a look of disgust on his face.

"You mean, she's in this building right now as we speak?" Peter asked him.

"Yes." He didn't fully understand what Peter was getting so worked up about.

Peter raced over to the door, delighted to see that it was open. "I have to see her."

Edmund pulled him away from the door. "Not now."

"Why not?" Peter asked, looking rather upset.

"She's coming back tonight," Edmund explained. Then he added, "Don't drink anything the White Witch gives you. It'll be worse this time."

"Meaning?" Peter started to turn away from the door.

"Meaning that it'll make you act...a little..." Edmund tried to think of a delicate way to put it. "Just a tad...like a...um...a heartless tyrant?" There wasn't a nice way to say 'evil' after all, it turned out.

"She won't leave my chamber until I drink whatever she gives me." Peter cringed, looking very distressed.

"Correction," Edmund said calmly. "She won't leave the room until she _thinks_ you drank whatever she gives you."

A slow smile started to spread across Peter's face. "That's a really good idea."

"I don't have bad ones," Edmund said proudly, putting his hands on his hips in a heroic way. "It's just something I'm blessed with."

Peter rolled his eyes, laughed, and shook his head. He grabbed Edmund by the arm and led him to the doorway. "Well, you had best get your arse out of here before Jadis comes in and sees you."

Edmund pulled the hood over his head again. "Back to cleaning those chamber pots..." He fake-glared at Peter. "You so owe me for this."

"I'll make it up to you after Narnia's free," Peter laugh-promised, shoving him out the door. "Now get!"

"Wow, looks like you're already a tyrannical bully," Edmund joked, leaving the room at last. "Why is she wasting a perfectly good potion on you again?"

"Very funny." Peter rolled his eyes again.

"You're not laughing," Edmund pointed out.

"I'm laughing on the inside." Peter shrugged, closing the door behind his brother. For the first time since Susan's betrayal, he felt happy again. Everything had seemed so bleak. And now, hope.

Edmund returned to the servant quarters to find Lucy standing next to the fireplace alone, looking around nervously as if anxiously waiting for something or someone. When she saw Edmund, she ran to him and whispered, "Where have you been?"

"With Peter," Edmund whispered back.

Lucy struggled to hold back a squeal. "Really? Is he alright?"

"He will be, I think." Edmund shrugged, leaning in closer to add, "I finally got a warning to him. Unless the witch finds out and pulls another trick on us, he'll be awake when Susan comes in to see him."

"Good." Lucy sighed happily.

"Where is Susan anyway?" Edmund asked, realizing that Lucy was alone. "She was supposed to be with you."

"She had to go," Lucy whispered, eyeing the setting sun from the window. "It's almost time. She told me not to leave this spot until you got back."

"Oh, alright then," Edmund said, relieved. Everything might just end up alright after all.

Jadis arrived at Peter's chamber just before Susan was to be admitted in. Peter was sitting at the edge of the bed, looking out the window, coming up with a plan to make her think he'd drank the contents of the bottle she was sure to hand him without actually drinking it.

Looking down at the passed-out dwarf on the floor in front of the doorway, Jadis shrugged, kicked him and then stepped over him to get into the room.

"How are you today, Peter?" she said, her voice that awful pretend sweet with traces of unmistakable iciness that Peter hated.

"Much better," Peter said. Actually it was the truth. Having a ray of hope at last did wonders for him, not that he was stupid enough to give it away by telling her about it.

"Good, you seem in better sprits this evening," Jadis was somewhere between suspicious and pleased. She took his hand and placed the glass bottle in it. "Here, drink it up."

Peter took off the cork and put it to his lips. Then he pretended to be shocked by something and pointed out the window. "What in the world could _that_ be?"

Jadis didn't flinch; her eyes narrowed and she looked like she was about to become very angry.

Peter realized he'd have to come up with something better than that. He squinted, pretending to be baffled by something right outside the window. "Jadis... Is it just me or is there a girl sitting outside with a pair of scissors, whistling to herself?"

Susan! Jadis thought furiously. What was she doing out there? How did she manage to find the high king's chamber from the outside? Jadis had picked this room for the reason that it was nearly impossible to locate by the windows. Wasn't that horrid girl supposed to be waiting to be let in? Was it really her out there? She glanced out the window to see for herself.

Well that worked, Peter thought as he dumped the drink out on the floor behind the bed post. Then he laid down half-on half-off the bed, pretending to be fast asleep.

"There's no one out..." Jadis started, before seeing that Peter was fast asleep. "...There," she finished. The bottle was empty. Good, as long as he drank it, that was all that mattered. She took the bottle away and walked out the door.

Susan was waiting to be let in, holding the wedding clothes in a bundle in her arms.

"Peter will see you now," Jadis said coldly, wondering how it was possible for the girl to have been in two places at once. Unless Peter was losing his mind and seeing things. Still, she couldn't wait to see Susan's reaction to the new Peter when he woke up in the morning.

Knowing something horrible must be in store, Susan nodded and bit her lip trying not to let her dread show in the expression on her face. With a light click, the door was locked behind her. Taking a deep breath, she looked around the room for Peter. She saw him asleep on the bed. Well, this wasn't anything new. Jadis sure was a witch of one idea.

She placed the wedding clothes down on a chair and them sat on the bed beside him. Looking to the window as the last remains of the sun slipped away, Susan felt someone grab one of her wrists. She let out a yelp of surprise.

Instantly Peter put his hand over her mouth. "Stop that," he said in a soft voice nearly breaking with emotion. "You're going to wake the whole castle."

Susan felt tears of joy fill her eyes. He was awake! And better still he was calling to mind their first night together. Something about his tone strongly suggested that he still cared about her.

He took his hand off her mouth, threw his arms around her, and embraced her. "I thought I would never see you again," he whispered as she sobbed in his arms.

"I'm so sorry..." Susan wailed, clinging onto him as tightly as she could, not wanting to ever let go. "I'm so sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen. Please forgive me."

He pulled away from her so he could look her directly in the eyes. "It's alright. I forgave you the second I heard you'd come."

"You knew I was here?" Susan asked him as he gently moved a lock of her hair behind her left ear. "How?"

"Edmund told me everything this afternoon," Peter told her as quickly as possible about the warning he'd been given. "Were you really in here with me the last two nights?"

Susan nodded, tears still streaming down her face. "Yes."

"My poor Su," he whispered, gently stroking the side of her right cheek.

She leaned forward and kissed him. He kissed her back and then held her close again. "I love you."

"I thought you said you weren't going to make that mistake again," Susan said sort of quietly.

He kissed her again. "It wasn't a mistake."

"I love you too," She told him, slipping her hand in his.

"Now we have to make some plans," Peter said seriously. "Do you and the others have anything in mind for stopping this wedding?"

Susan shook her head sadly. "The only way for you to be free of Jadis is if she renounces her claim to you. I can't think of anything that would make her do that."

Peter looked like he was in deep thought. "She's proud."

"Yes..." Susan wondered what he was getting at.

"Thinks there's nothing she can't do..." Peter went on.

"Yes..."

"But I know one thing she can't do." He reached under his pillow and pulled out the night-shirt Susan had made back in Cair Paravel, the one stained with the tallow drops. "She can't wash this."

A grin started to spread on Susan's face as she took the shirt from him and traced her fingers along the waxy blot, remembering what Lucy had told her about the fabric made from the scissors. "But I can."

Peter nodded and put his arm around her, pulling her close to him again. "Exactly."


	20. Wedding plans

Together, Susan and Peter came up with a plan. A way to trick Jadis into renouncing her claim to Peter. First they would let her think that she had won. Peter would act as though he had drank the potion and was now cold-hearted and cruel. Susan would act as though this distressed her and pretend to be on the verge of running away at any moment. Then, at the wedding, Peter would make a flattering speech about how Jadis could do anything and then trick her into agreeing to prove it, renouncing her claim to him if she could not, and giving it up in favor of anyone who could.

The only thing that Peter thought was going to be particularly hard was pretending to be cruel. It was bad enough to think that he would likely have to snap at the servants -the good Narnians whom he loved and respected so deeply- but he also would have to be unkind to Susan. Sure it was only acting, but that didn't mean he'd like it.

After all their planning, very close to morning, they grew tired and fell asleep on the bed. The sound of the door clanking open at dawn woke them both but only Susan opened her eyes. Peter pretended to still be asleep.

"Good morning, wench," Jadis said icily.

"Morning, witch," Susan sneered back as she got up and stood in front of her.

"Soon you'll be saying, 'Your Majesty' on threat of your life," Jadis warned her.

"I'd sooner drown myself in the river," Susan shot back, unwilling to think of Jadis being the true queen of anything that wasn't a stone fruitcake.

"Keep it up and maybe that will be arranged," Jadis hissed through her teeth, taking a threatening step towards her.

Susan winced but tried to act like she hadn't. "Peter's asleep."

"You don't miss a thing." Jadis laughed.

"I can't try the clothing on him like this," Susan reminded her.

"He'll be up in a few moments," Jadis promised.

Susan used the best of her acting abilities to pretend she was excited about this and kept peering over at Peter eagerly. Finally he yawned, blinked, and sat up.

"Peter!" Susan cried out happily.

He looked at her with complete repulsion (the trick was to look at Susan but think of Jadis). "Who is this?" he demanded angrily.

Susan rushed over to him. "Peter, it's me, Susan!"

He blinked indifferently. "Never heard of you." He glanced over at Jadis. "Who let this shameless hussy in here?"

Susan forced the corners of her lips to go down lest her smile give their plan away. "Peter!"

He didn't glance her way but continued to look at Jadis.

"She's only the tailor," Jadis explained, shooting Susan a triumphant look. "She has brought up the clothes for our wedding." She waved her hand at the chair. "Shall she try them on you now?"

"Leave them where they are," Peter said meanly, taking a step closer to Jadis. "I'll try them on myself later. I don't want your dirty little paws on me."

The White Witch's grin widened. "You heard him."

Susan promptly thrust her face into her hands and pretended to cry. She opened her fingers just wide enough to watch Jadis and Peter through.

"I have to say, evil becomes you." Jadis beamed at him, grabbing onto his arm.

Peter wondered if she was trying to flirt with him. Ew. This was even worse than having to act cruel. What was he supposed to say to that? Other than, 'Unhand me, witch!' of course. Maybe if he just smiled and nodded until she went away...

Jadis wondered if there was something wrong with Peter's neck. He was nodding an awful lot. Before she could ponder on this though, she remembered that Susan was still in the room. She glanced over at her and spotted her right eye looking out at them through her fingers.

"Get out!" Jadis barked at her. "The night is over and he doesn't want you, go away."

With one last desperate glance at Peter -who looked away apathetically- Susan raced out of the room, pretending to be in a fit of tears.

After that, Jadis let go of Peter's arm and said that she had some things to take care of and would be back later. Little did she know that she hadn't won. She was about to lose. And, in a way, Susan had already come off the victor.

Downstairs, Susan whispered the true story of what had happened with herself, Jadis, and Peter to Edmund and Lucy certain that sooner or later the other servants would hear a very different version.

"You fooled her?" Edmund whisper-gasped in excited disbelief. "She didn't know he was acting?"

"She never suspected a thing," Susan said proudly.

"She's coming!" some of the servants cried out in terror, rushing about the kitchen, trying to get to their places before Jadis arrived.

For once, the White Witch didn't demand to know how the work was coming along and she didn't shout at any of the servants. Rather, she scanned the room to see if Susan was still there. In a way, she wanted her to be. Not because she didn't want her to flee the castle and jump off a cliff, but because she'd realized that if Susan left, she wouldn't be able to make the fine food appear for the wedding. She'd decided that what she really wanted to scare Susan from was Peter himself. Having an extra servant in the castle for little longer wouldn't be such a bad thing, after the wedding she could just turn her into stone. Although, if she had already left, she would be spared that bother. In a strange way, a win-win.

Susan was there, standing next to the over grown dwarf and his wife again. Why did she like them so much? She never seemed to talk much with the other kitchen dwarfs although she was allowed to. Perhaps the others didn't wish to speak to her because they feared being turned into stone. Jadis liked that.

"You still here?" Jadis raised an eyebrow at Susan.

Susan nodded.

"You wont be allowed in the king's chamber again," Jadis told her. "He asked me to tell you that he finds your distasteful visits vulgar and wants you to leave him alone."

"The high king _said_ that?" Freedial the centaur was just outside the kitchen carrying in some crops for the servants to add to the stew Jadis had demanded for that night and heard what she said. "I don't believe it."

Susan gulped, feeling very afraid for him. She liked Freedial as well as his friend Hishtack and didn't want either of them turned to stone. Why would he speak so boldly? Wasn't he afraid?

But Jadis didn't turn him into stone. She just laughed. Laughed, like he'd told a funny joke. "The high king grows weary of all of you trouble makers. He'll want me to keep you all in line." She tapped her wand proudly. "So in the future, don't dare to contradict me." And pointed to Susan. "And you. As a servant here, I expect you to remember your place. The high king has no use for you now."

The passing days were like a blur of work. Jadis wanted this or that done in time for the wedding. Or this or that thing moved here or there in time for the wedding. It seemed that every sentence spoken ended in, 'The Wedding'. Susan didn't see Peter at all the first few days. He was up in his chamber where she was still forbidden to go. But knowing that he loved her and was only pretending to care for wicked doings and for Jadis made it much easier to endure than it had been before. Susan knew that she wasn't going to be an ordinary servant at this wedding like Jadis assumed. She was going to play a far greater part. And she wanted to be prepared for it. Whenever she had some time to herself-rare as it was-she worked with Lucy's scissors, making a fine gown and a long black narrow cloak with a hood which would keep it covered. She hid these things under a floor board in an old storage closet that housed mostly broken mops.

A day before the wedding was to take place, Susan was shelling peanuts by the kitchen fireplace while Lucy did patchwork meddling a cape that was to be worn by one of the witch's dwarfs and Edmund cleaned a giant-sized chamber pot, they heard the familiar cry of, "She's coming!"

Suddenly someone called out, "They're coming!"

 _They're_ coming? They. Not just Jadis. Had she brought one of her wolves down with her?

Looking up, Susan saw, much to her surprise, Peter standing there beside Jadis. The Witch had decided that she wanted to show her slaves and servants the new behavior of their high king. She wasn't fool enough to lead him out for all of Narnia to see -at least not yet- but she wanted the kitchen staff to let go of any hopes they may of had.

Susan forced herself to tear her eyes away from him and act like she wasn't glad to see him, like his being there distressed her. It wasn't easy. After not seeing him since that night they'd made the plan for his freedom, she was eager to speak with him again and very happy to see him there. She felt sorry for the servants who wouldn't know that any cruel thing Peter might say or do here would only be an act.

"Your majesty!" gasped Hishtack (he was the centaur at the doorway this time).

Peter ignored him. He looked over to the pot where a stew of some kind was being made. Knowing he had to keep Jadis thinking he was evil now, he kicked it, spilling it all over the floor.

The servants gasped.

"Oh hush up, you harpies!" Peter shouted at them. "It was ill-prepared anyway."

"As you all know," Jadis announced, "tomorrow is our wedding and I want all of you to be on your best behavior." She waved her wand at them. "Or else."

"I say we just turn them all to stone now." Peter laughed bitterly. "I hate the sight of them."

Wow, he's good, Edmund thought feeling proud of his brother.

Lucy -even though she knew he was pretending- couldn't help being taken aback. Could this cold-hearted nightmare really be the loving brother who raised her? Thank goodness it wasn't real. If it was real, she'd be fleeing much faster Susan. What good was anything if her beloved brother suddenly because a cruel tyrant? How good it was to know the truth!

Jadis seemed very pleased by Peter's comment. "Maybe after the wedding. I'd hate to have to go servant hunting before tomorrow when there's so much to be done here."

Peter focused on Susan now. "If it isn't the tailor," he sneered. "What are you still doing here?"

She played along. "Peter, please! You must remember me."

"Must I?" he said coldly.

"Why are you being like this?" Susan cried out, standing up so that all the peanut shells fell dramatically to the ground. "Don't you care about your people anymore?"

"Of course I do..." Peter's voice was bitter-sweet like someone who is about to add a punch line. "...They exist to do my bidding."

Edmund thought the performance was really getting good and thought it would be even better with snacks. He found it nothing short of amazing that his soon to be sister-in-law and his brother could pretend their relationship was in shambles when it wasn't.

Susan pretended to be horrified. "Don't say that!" She reached out and touched his arm.

Peter shoved her away. "Don't touch me, wench!"

Lucy shuddered. It's not real, she had to remind herself. It's make-believe. Only pretend.

On his way out of the kitchen, Peter kicked one of the dwarfs very hard in the side. He reminded himself to make it up to him somehow once this was over. Maybe give him gold. The poor Dwarf let out a whimper, clutching his right hip. Lots and lots of gold...

The next day, Susan dressed herself in the ugly servant rags and grabbed Helen's cloth. She couldn't wear her fine clothes for the first part of the wedding (Jadis was having the feast first and then the ceremony) as she had to be on hand to clap over the cloth for the food to appear.

The White Witch's guests were all the vile creatures that you could ever imagine. Goblins, Trolls, evil beasts, dwarfs who were not loyal Narnians, talking wolves and dogs, and creatures that appeared almost human but were not. Some were very ugly but others were beautiful in appearance -somehow these lovely ones were worse, giving you an unholy feeling. They sneered and jeered at the poor shaken broken-hearted servants who set down extra napkins and silverware for them.

In his seat beside the witch, Peter knew who the 'dwarf' with the shaking hands placing down his knife and fork was. None other than his dear little Lucy. When he was sure no one was looking, he grabbed her hand under the table and squeezed in a reassuring way. Lucy squeezed back, making sure to keep the expression on her face from giving her away. When they sensed eyes turning to them, they let go of each other's hands and Lucy shuffled back into the kitchen.

Susan knew her part. She was to spread the cloth out and clap over it. She was careful to make no eye contact with Peter what-so-ever as she did so. The guests were ravenous over the food and swallowed it up like pigs. It was a hideous sight and Susan couldn't bear to watch. Instead she walked to the back of the room where she wasn't likely to be noticed and could watch Peter from afar.

Jadis made a speech about her conquest of Narnia and the guests all clapped proudly. She was fairly bursting with pride.

"You look so lovely, Jadis," one of the guests gushed. "Where did you get that gown?"

"I made it myself," Jadis said, taking a sip of wine.

Liar, Susan thought, wishing that there was poison in the cup the witch was drinking from. How was it that none of the kitchen staff had thought to add some?

"Isn't the bridegroom the baby you turned into a bear cub nearly sixteen years ago?" another guest asked, looking over at Peter.

"Yes," Jadis said proudly. "He's really grown up, hasn't he?" She put her hand on his shoulder.

Peter didn't mean to, but he shuddered. He couldn't help it. He hated her hands on him. For the past few days he'd been willing himself to repress his disgust until they finished the plan, but it was getting harder and harder. He had to think of something so he blamed it on a sudden draft, claiming he shivered because he was cold.

As if he'd just said something utterly hilarious, all the guest burst into laughter. Then they went back to eating and burping rudely with no regard for manners.

Quite unexpectedly, Jadis kissed Peter on the cheek. He tried not to shudder again and managed to only half-shudder but he was completely sickened by it. Susan glared at the witch furiously. This was something of a mistake, Jadis realized Susan was still in the room watching them. Rather than give the plan away, however, all it did was make Jadis even more proud. She liked how unhappy Susan was watching her with Peter. That would teach her!

Looking away, Susan went back into the kitchen, opened the storage closet and changed into the fine gown she'd made. It was long and purple with royal flourishes added here and there. Then she took the long black cloak and put it over the dress so that it covered it completely. Throwing the hood over her head, she walked out to join the guests for the wedding ceremony.


	21. Who can wash the shirt?

Edmund tried not to laugh when he saw who was performing the wedding ceremony. It was the dwarf he'd hit on the head the day he'd warned Peter of the witch's plans. Sure enough, there was a large lump on his head in roughly the shape of a sword hilt. Both Edmund and Lucy had a very clear view of him -as well as Jadis and Peter- now because they weren't standing with the servants. Because Lucy had the fine coats and capes made for the witch's dwarfs to wear at the ceremony so that she could mend them, they were able to slip them on thus covering their faces, shove the real dwarfs in the closet (after Susan took the dress and cloak out of course), and take their place on the dais beside the wolves.

Lucy tried not to let her fear of the wolves show and was very glad that she had remembered to make the hood seven inches longer than they'd told her to. There was no chance of anyone seeing her for who she really was under it.

Edmund had a harder time than her, but not because he was afraid of the wolves. He had to keep bending his knees to make himself appear shorter whenever the White Witch looked his way. He didn't want her to identify him as the bizarrely tall kitchen dwarf. His legs were simply killing him after only the first three minutes of this. Thankfully, Jadis didn't look his way as often as she might have, being too focused on her guests and Peter.

Watching all this from under the dark hood of her cloak, Susan found herself surprisingly jealous of the witch even though she knew what was going to happen. Jadis _did_ look beautiful. Her long hair was half-up half-down and her eyes shone brightly with excitement (evil excitement but excitement all the same). The gown fit her perfectly, not even being -as most gowns for a seven foot lady might be- too short at the bottom. Even though she knew Peter didn't love and wouldn't marry Jadis, Susan felt horrible seeing them standing side by side like that.

The only thing that made Susan feel happy again was when she heard one of the guests whisper, "She's too tall for him."

Susan smiled at that. It was true. Peter looked handsome and Jadis looked stunning, but standing together they did look quite ridiculous. Unless Jadis got down on her knees, they wouldn't even be eye to eye if they happened to look at each other!

Just as the dwarf opened his mouth to speak, Peter held up his hand. "Wait."

" _Wait_?" Jadis echoed, looking exasperated. Here she was on the brink of getting all of Narnia in her hands by marrying its king and he wanted to wait? Wait for what? For her to kick him in the shins (which is what she really felt like doing at the moment)?

"Jadis, greatest queen of Narnia," Peter said, reminding himself that he mustn't give himself away by laughing, no matter how absurd the things he had to say were. "It is upon this of all days that you should be known as the most powerful lady that ever was."

The guests applauded.

J

adis liked that. Usually when someone talked about her like that she would hit them and tell them not to waste her time with flattery but maybe just this once -it was a special day after all- she could hear her admirer out. Now that she was going to have all of Narnia in her hands for ever, she had all the time she needed.

"There is nothing great or small that you cannot do," Peter went on. "Is that not the truth?"

Everyone looked at Jadis for her answer. "It is truth."

"I know it is," Peter lied, trying to look at her as though he was actually fond of her. It was extremely difficult and he only managed a sort of half smile by imagining that it was Susan standing in front of him. "Which is why you are the only one fit to marry me and rule Narnia by my side."

One of the guests noticed that person in the hooded cloak wasn't clapping with everyone else and elbowed her. Susan let out a grunt and clapped briefly and dismally.

"Which is why, I ask of you great Jadis, a moment of proof," Peter said, forcing his smile to widen by reminding himself that he would soon be rid of this horrible witch.

"Proof?" Jadis blinked in surprise. What did he mean by that?

"We all know there is nothing you can't do," Peter explained. "So I ask for you, as the bride, to perform a simple task. If you succeed, we will all have proof of your ability and power. Everyone will. No one will ever dare to question you again. Made a vow, if you please, that to the one who can do this task shall the claim to me be given. To that one only I shall marry." He paused for a moment and then added, "Though I know it will be you."

Jadis wanted to refuse. She wanted to tell him to hush up and let them go on with the wedding. But she could see clear as day that everyone's curiosity was now peaked thanks to his stupid little speech. If she refused to grant his request they might wonder if it was because she was afraid to do whatever it was he asked of her. If there really was something she could not do. Perhaps if she could give a real reason not to -one that was not fear- they would be satisfied.

"We haven't time for any great task," Jadis declared. "We're in the middle of a wedding!"

"Oh, this is not a great task at all," Peter assured her in a flattering tone. "It's very simple. I promise. Do make the vow and prove yourself to all of your subjects."

 _Well when he puts it that way..._ Jadis thought she might as well get it over with. "Very well, I shall make the vow and prove myself the true queen of Narnia."

"Very good," Peter said, snapping his fingers at a nearby servant. "Bring out a wash basin."

"Wash basin?" Jadis herself was starting to feel a little curious now. What was he thinking of?

Once the basin along with soap and water were brought out, Peter lifted one of the folds of his wedding cape and pulled out a white night shirt he'd kept hidden under there. He unfolded it and held it up for everyone to see.

"This shirt has a stain on it," Peter told them, motioning to the waxy drops. "Any proper wife ought to be able to get it out. Jadis will prove herself by getting it clean for me."

I'm the queen, thought Jadis angrily, as she took the shirt from Peter, I should never have to wash anything; especially in front of my subjects!

No one seemed to know how to react and all looked to the dwarf performing the ceremony. He mouthed, "Clap, you idiots, clap."

They all applauded again. Even Susan, who was now getting a delightful tingle of excitement up and down her spine. Jadis would never be able to get the shirt clean.

Jadis dipped the shirt into the water and scrubbed. Nothing. The stubborn wax wouldn't come off. She tried harder. Nothing. She tried harder still scrubbing at it until her white hands turned a reddish colour. She even tried ways only a witch can try. All that did was make the stains bigger. She wanted to scream and hurl the shirt at her groom's head.

"What's wrong, my bride?" Peter asked pretend-innocently. "Haven't you gotten it clean yet?"

"Shut up," Jadis barked, demanding that someone get her some more soap.

After twenty minutes, Peter went over to the basin and said, "Let's see how it's coming."

Jadis didn't want to lift it, knowing perfectly well the stains weren't gone, but everyone's eyes were on her.

Mortified, she lifted it up.

Everyone gasped when they saw the stains worse than before, clear as day. The witch had not cleaned them away. No, _could not_ clean them away!

Peter shook his head in disgust. "And you call yourself the queen of Narnia."

The guests started whispering to each other. What was wrong with Jadis? Why had this happened? Why had she let it happen? Was she really as powerful as she claimed to be? Maybe they shouldn't fear her at all. Why, she couldn't even wash a simple night-shirt!

Lashing out in anger, Jadis slapped Peter across the face so hard that he fell to the ground. "Don't you dare speak to me like that!"

Lucy let out a cry, but it was muffled by her hood and by the sound of everyone else's gasping. Jadis had not only been put to shame in public but also had just struck the groom across the face.

Edmund winced when his brother was slapped. Poor Peter. That looked like it really hurt.

Susan was horrified. That hadn't been part of the plan. No one had expected Jadis to do that. Of course she would be angry. She shuddered to think how much more angry the witch would be when she proved that _she_ could wash it. It was frightening, but it had to be risked. If not, Peter wouldn't be completely saved. Jadis had given up her claim to him only in favor of one who could do something she could not. If Susan didn't prove herself to be that one, Peter would be quite possibly in more danger than ever before.

Peter stood up, rubbing his flaming cheek. Bravely he turned to the crowd and said, "See? See how your queen is? She is only one of words and force. Where is her true power?"

Jadis prepared to hit him again but then heard the murmuring guests. She mustn't let them think that Peter was telling the truth. "He's a liar!" she exclaimed, holding up the stained shirt for them all to see. "This is not normal. There's magic in this. I tell you, no one can wash it clean!"

"Let someone try," Peter suggested, trying to forget about his stinging cheek for a moment. He pointed to one of the guests. She was one of the bad dryads who was on the witch's side (thus the reason she had been invited). "You. Come up here and try."

The dryad looked somewhere between flattered and frightened. On the one hand she was thrilled that she had just been picked out of the crowd to wash the shirt and perhaps win herself a king. But what if Jadis had spoken the truth and was angry? What if she really was as powerful as she claimed to be?

Shaking with fear she said, "Please sire, I do not want to."

Peter had expected this. "Fine then, be a coward." He turned his attention back to all of the guests. "Who will be brave enough to try to wash the shirt? If any of you are willing, let that one come forward."

Still covered by the hooded cloak, Susan took a few steps forward, coming closer and closer to the dais.

"Ah, finally a brave face," Peter announced proudly.

"I see no face," Jadis retorted bitterly.

"It does not matter," Peter shrugged. "I think I once knew what it was like to have to hide my face. Let the lass -if that is what you are- come to the basin. If you are something different, still come and try."

Susan took her hands out from under the cloak and took the night-shirt from a scowling Jadis. Then she took it to the basin, dipped it in the water, and scrubbed. In only four minutes, Susan pulled out the shirt. Clean as could be. Sparking white without so much as a trace of the former stains.

There was a collective gasp followed by a very loud applause. Even those who had wanted Jadis for queen were clapping for her. The servants who had been watching from the kitchen doorway were delighted and clapped even louder than the guests.

"I'm yours." Peter's smile was genuine this time.

"Who are you?" Jadis demanded, her cheeks flushed with rage.

Susan lifted her hood, revealing her face. She smiled and took a step closer to Peter.

"You!" Jadis hissed, her eyes flashing with dangerous amounts of anger.

Next, Edmund came forward and took off his dwarf-hood, turning to address everyone watching them. "We have now seen for ourselves the true bride of the high king. This is Lady Susan Pevensie of the land of Spare Oom."

After a moment's hesitation, the crowd broke into delighted cheers -with the exception of some of the White Witch's guests. Not that it mattered, because the happy cries of the servants were more than loud enough to fill in for them.

Furious, Jadis grabbed hold of her wand and lifted it towards Susan. Seeing what was about to happen, Edmund pulled something long and sharp out from under the dwarf-cape. It was the sword from the display stand that he'd swiped the day he'd found and warned Peter. Quick as he could possibly manage, he slammed the sword down on the witch's wand, slicing it in half. It made a shattering sound like that of a crystal bowl when it falls from a high countertop to a tile floor below.

Jadis looked down at the broken wand in her hand and then back at Edmund. "I should have killed you when you first came to me as a toddler." With those words, she stabbed him in the stomach with the broken wand.

"Edmund!" Lucy, Susan, and Peter screamed at the same time.

He gulped, gaping at the witch for a moment before falling to the ground with his eyes closed.

Breathing became very hard. He made raspy breaths hoping to at least get some air, but none of it seemed of any real use.

Looking away from his injured brother with tears in his eyes, Peter shouted. "To arms, Narnia!"

At the sound of his voice the servants realized that he was on their side after all and charged forward.

Soon there was a full pitched battle. Shoving, stabbing, pushing, swords clanking back and forth. The centaurs came in to join the fight. Some didn't have swords and introduced a lot of kicking to the battle.

Jadis would have stood a chance at winning if she had only her wand and the loyalty of all of the guests she'd invited. She'd lost a fair share of them and it seemed as though her side might have had to give into the Narnians.

Unwilling to admit, defeat, She shoved two hapless fauns and took their swords. She charged at Peter with them. He was of no use to her now that she'd lost her claim to him. She would teach him and that stupid little girl to plot against her.

Peter didn't have a sword at the moment and would have been killed if Susan hadn't screamed, "Peter, watch out!"

He ducked and the witch missed him by a hair. Jadis grunted and tried again.

He jumped out of the way just in time to avoid injury, or worse. Under the cloak, Susan wore a belt over her dress which still had Peter's sword attached to it. She ran as quickly as she could over to Peter and shouted, "Peter! Catch!" She threw the sword to him.

He leapt up and caught it by the hilt, swinging it at Jadis. The stroke would have sliced her head clean off if she had been a little slower.

Meanwhile, Lucy fought off two of the witch's dwarfs who were crowding around Edmund for spoil, thinking that once he was dead, they could take his fine clothing and also his sword.

Much as she hated it, she had to use her dagger on one of them. She now understood why her mother had hoped she would never have to use it. It felt horrible to have to harm another living thing. Oh how awful it was! When at last she was with her hurt brother, she took out her cordial, opened the diamond bottle, and let a drop fall into his gasping mouth.

He relaxed and stopped gasping. She wondered if it meant he was dead or if it meant he was healing. _Please don't be dead, Edmund._ Finally, there was a light cough. Then another one. His chest started moving again and Lucy felt relief running through her. She helped her brother to his feet.

Seeing Edmund standing completely healed beside Lucy, Peter suddenly felt much stronger. It had been hard to fight with the thought of his dying brother on his mind. Now he fought with all his might. They could still win. And then freedom, true freedom. Once they won this battle, it would all be over. No more trouble in Narnia, no more being a white bear, no more having to act cruel, no more any of it!

Susan also began fighting much harder. She used the bow and arrows -like the horse ridding it was something that came natural to her- to shoot at the witch's guests who still followed her. After a while, though, she grew very wearily. Peter and Jadis were still going at it back and forth with their swords so fast that you didn't see swords but blurry silver lines that looked wavy like a game of jump-rope. It couldn't go on like this for ever. Peter might get hurt.

Suddenly, a new idea came to Susan. She thought of Aslan. He couldn't free Peter from the witch because of the claim which was why he sent them on his breath to rescue the high king on their own. But now Jadis had renounced it. There was nothing except the battle itself holding Peter and the others captive. Remembering her ivory horn, Susan reached under the cloak, next to where the sword had been. She pulled out the little white horn, put it to her lips, and blew. A rich deep sound echoed off the walls of the castle, and, as if the world was coming to an end, everyone stopped what they were doing and looked around as though completely stunned, searching for the source of the sound.

Just then, there was a crash and a large Lion came leaping through the window. He jumped onto the dais and let out a roar.

"Aslan!" Lucy exclaimed happily.

The roar echoed even louder than the horn had and everyone was even more dazed than before. Then, Aslan sprung out at Jadis, pinning her to the ground under this terrible paws. She gave him a look of utter disbelief. How could this be happening to her? No one saw what happened next, not even the most horribly brave could stand to actually watch, but they knew that Aslan killed her.

Aslan walked away from the witch's dead body and spoke to Peter: "It is finished. The curse has ended."

At once all of those who were on the witch's side suddenly burst into nothing or else gave themselves up.

"No more curse..." Peter shook his head, a smile beginning to creep up onto his face. "I can't believe it!"

Susan came over to him and he threw his arms around her exclaiming, "It's over, I'm free!" He pulled Lucy and Edmund into the hug too. "We're all free!"

"At last!" Lucy cried happily as the four of them continued to cling to each other, overcome with joy.

"Three cheers for the daughter of Eve!" the servants cried out.

Susan pulled away from the huddle and shook her head at them. "Aslan's the one who killed her. Go cheer for him."

"But you saved the high king!" they exclaimed. "You got him away from the witch. You broke the curse!"

"But I didn't!" Susan huffed, feeling rather frustrated. "I betrayed him, remember?"

"Child," Aslan said kindly, resting his soft velvet-like nose on her forehead for a moment. "You _have_ broken the curse. By righting the wrong." He motioned over to Peter. "I think he'd agree with me."

Peter came over and put his arm around Susan's shoulders. "Come on," he said, giving her a light kiss on the forehead. "Let's go home."


	22. And they all lived happily ever after

"We must make haste," Aslan said gravely. "Now that Jadis is dead, everything she ever created must die too."

Before anyone could ask what he meant by that, a large drop of water fell from the ceiling, landing on the tip of Susan's nose. Then another hit Edmund on the top of the head. Then another struck the side of Lucy's hand. Freedial had to leap out of the way to avoid being crushed by a falling pillar which he'd always assumed was made of stone but was really made of ice.

"The castle's melting!" Peter exclaimed, his eyes widening with fear. "We have to get out now!"

Hishtack grabbed Susan by the hand and swung her onto his back. "I'll get the daughter of Eve out of here, your majesty." He galloped out of the castle as fast as his hooves would carry him.

"What about Peter?" Susan asked, looking at him over her shoulder as Hishtack continued to gallop out of the melting palace.

"He'll be fine," Hishtack promised her as they dodged another falling ice pillar and were soaked by enough water to fill a bucket.

Close behind them, Aslan was racing out with Lucy, Edmund, and a kind-faced dwarf seated on his back.

The six of them breathlessly made it outside. From there they could see the melting castle's destruction much more clearly. Its very glow seemed to be fading. It reminded Susan of a dim electric-torch when the battery is dying. The towers, even those that hadn't seemed to be made of ice at all, were dripping down like waterfalls, faster and faster.

Out of the main doors, which thankfully had not yet started to melt, the servants came rushing for dear life. Some led their children or elderly parents by the hand as they ran out. Others carried what spoil they had managed to grab; mostly little baskets, small silver chains, and other minor objects. Nearly everyone seemed to be accounted for. Freedial and the washer woman as well as all the others whom had once belonged to the court of King Frank. But one person had yet to show. Peter.

Susan didn't take her eyes away from the door for a moment, unable to bear the thought of him possibly being buried under the ice after all this. The side of the door everyone had gotten out through started to melt. Half of the castle was already a pile of slush. _Oh, Peter, please be alright._

The door was shrinking now. Lucy looked like she was going to cry and Edmund kept tugging nervously at his own left earlobe. Where was their brother?

Finally, when they thought they could stand it no longer, a tall figure ducked to walk under the almost non-existent doorway. The high king stood there, soaking wet from head to toe, carrying something in his arms. A little dwarf-child who was lame and hadn't been able to run out with the others. He was an orphan and was also very quiet by nature. In all of the excitement, the poor thing had been forgotten in the back of the kitchen. Peter had been about to leave when he heard crying and had gone to rescue him. The dwarf-child had been nearly drowned because he was trapped in part of the kitchen that had turned into a sink hole when the castle started to melt and the drops from the ceiling had gotten bigger and bigger, making the water level rise.

At seeing the high king with the dwarf-child everyone cheered. If they hadn't completely gotten all of their faith in him restored before, they had now. He was on their side. The true king of the Narnians.

And Susan was the one with the claim to rule by his side as his wife and Narnia's queen.

Some of the dwarfs who were distantly related to the lame dwarf-child took him from Peter, promising to raise him as though he was their own son.

"Peter!" Susan jumped off of Histack's back and ran into his arms.

He held her close to him. "See? I'm fine. We don't have to worry about being apart ever again."

"Also-" He took something that he had strapped to his belt and handed it to her. It was her sack, which still held Lucy's scissors and the golden wreath-crown. "You might want this back. I found it in the kitchen when I went in to help the dwarf-child."

"Thanks." Susan smiled at him as he took her hand and started leading her into a forest that she could have sworn wasn't there a moment ago. Weren't they on top of a cliff? She looked around and realized that after the castle had melted, the land must have just gone back to the way it was before the White Witch changed it for her own gain.

Most of the servants ran off into the woods on their own ready to start their new lives. Most shook the high king's hand and told him they would always serve him before taking off but some were too excited for manners and went without so much as a word of thanks.

Hishtack and Freedial decided that they wanted to come live in Cair Paravel and take up work there if the monarchs were willing. And of course, they were. So, along with Aslan, they all traveled down to Helen's cottage.

When she saw them from the window, she rushed out and embraced her eldest son. "My white bear cub is freed at last!" Tears slid down her cheeks as she clung to the young man who had once been her little boy.

"Mother," Peter whispered softly, overcome with joy once more. He'd thought she was lost for ever. But now they were all together again. With Jadis out of the way, Helen could come back to Cair Paravel, never having to part with her children again.

"I knew you could do it." Helen beamed at Edmund, Lucy, and Susan. "I knew you'd save him."

With that, Aslan's breath lifted the five of them, as well as the two centaurs, high into air to carry them back over the river home to Cair Paravel where they would surely live happily ever after.

_fifteen years later..._

It was winter at Cair Paravel and the orchards were covered with snow. Edmund sat inside with a cup of tea and a book at the window-seat of one of the castle's many sitting rooms.

"Uncle Edmund, Uncle Edmund!"

Edmund looked up his book to see his three little nieces rushing towards him, still bundled up in their coats, cloaks, hats, scarves, and muffs, not having bothered to take any of it off.

"What is it?" he asked them.

"Guess what we saw?" the eldest girl exclaimed breathlessly.

The younger two bounced up and down, unable to stay still.

"What did you see?" He smiled, waiting for them to catch their breaths and tell him.

His brother's daughters never failed to be a source of deep amusement to him. The eldest girl looked just like her father with blue eyes and blond hair but acted so much like Susan that sometimes she seemed to be mimicking her. The two younger ones were twins who looked like their mother, having inherited her long dark hair and distinctive facial features, but their personality was much more like Peter's.

"We saw a white bear!" one of the twins blurted out.

"A real one!" the other twin added.

"Did you say hello?" Edmund asked, his eyes twinkling with an amused glimmer.

"Oh, we weren't sure if he was a _talking_ bear or not," the eldest explained with a shrug of her shoulders. "Mummy says not to approach creatures when we aren't certain they aren't wild."

Edmund chuckled a little. "Sounds like your mother alright."

"Did you ever see a white bear?" one of the twins asked him.

A smile crept on Edmund's face. "Actually, yes."

"Tell us about it!" they begged. "Please, Uncle? Pretty please?"

"It's a bit of a long story," Edmund warned them.

"We don't mind." They all sat down in a circle around him.

Edmund stood up from their tight circle, went over to a small trunk, and took out a small model of a white bear. He set it down in the middle of them for dramatic effect. Then, rejoining their circle, he smiled and began the story, "Once upon a time there was a white bear who wasn't really a white bear at all but a high king under a spell..."

-The End-


	23. DELETED SCENE

Downstairs in the throne room, Peter found Edmund waiting there for him as he sometimes did in the morning.

"Gosh Pete, you look awful..." Edmund commented, noticing the rings around his eyes. "Did you get any sleep?"

"Well... No," Peter admited, unable to force the corners of his mouth out of the shape of a smile.

"What is _with_ you?" Edmund asked, trying -and failing- not to laugh as he spoke.

"What do you mean?" Peter shrugged.

"You didn't get any sleep and your hair is whiter than cotton balls, you look horrible, you're about to turn back into a bear again, and yet I can't remember the last time I saw you looking this happy," Edmund explained.

"It's nothing," Peter lied, unable to look his brother in the eye.

"Oh come on." Edmund patted his hand on the throne next to him. "Sit down and tell little brother all about it."

"I'm not telling you anything," Peter said firmly. "Nothing. Zip. Nada."

"Why not?" Edmund asked. "It's not like I can't already guess."

"You couldn't guess if your life depended on it," Peter laugh-retorted.

"You've fallen in love with Susan." Edmund raised an eyebrow as if to say, 'I'm right, aren't I?'

"Dang it, Edmund!" Peter exclaimed, amazed at his brother's uncanny ablity to read emotions. "How do you do that?"

"I'm you brother, I can tell." Edmund shrugged his shoulders. "So you might as well sit down and tell me all about it."

Peter took a seat and opened his mouth to speak.

"Wait, before you start, I just want to say, no mushy stuff," Edmund told him firmly. "I mean it, Peter."

"Please, like I'd ever share that part of my life with _you,_ " Peter sneered. Then he turned a little red and looked down. "Not that there's anything to share...I haven't even told her how I feel yet."

"Why not?" Edmund asked, thinking how this was better than a drama-play and how much more enjoyable it would be with snacks.

"Well I don't know if she feels the same way," Peter explained sheepishly. "I didn't even know I felt that way until I was leaving her this morning. And then...I don't know...I just knew it."

"Aw, that's so sweet! You can tell her how you've been madly in love with her for five whole minutes," Edmund teased, with a funny little smirk on his face.

"Oh shut up, Edmund." Peter laughed, giving his brother a playful shove.

"Make me," Edmund said.

"I did kiss her though," Peter admited sort of quietly.

"Ew, I said no mushy stuff!" Edmund protested, putting his hands over his ears.

"Oh calm down, it was only on the forehead," Peter told him, pulling Edmund's hands off his ears. "Don't be so immature."


End file.
